The South - West End Centre, Aldershot - 4th June 2014

This was a rarity - I went to a concert with my wife!

She's not a fan of late nights or most concerts, but when I saw "The South" (a large remnant of "The Beautiful South") were playing at our local venue, I asked, as I often do, if she fancied coming along and expected her to say no, but to my surprise she was very enthusiastic.

'The South' are fronted by original vocalist (and former Housemartins drummer!), Dave Hemingway, and Alison Wheeler, who's been in the band since 2003 (when it was still "The Beautiful South") as the female-vocal in the band.

There are plenty of other members of the band who were there in the "Beautiful" days, but the band isn't all about nostalgia as they've released an album, "Sweet Refrains", of original material recently and very good it is too.

They started out with a track from that album, "Stick It In and Turn It", which certainly set a positive tone and got the fairly crowded (albeit tiny) venue (more than once Alison commented she'd never been THAT close to an audience before) straight into the mood.

A couple of lesser know songs followed and then the massive hit, "A Little Time" which I thought was better than the single release as Wheeler's voice is less scratchy (in my opinion) than Jacqui Abbott's on that track (which appears to have been a conscious thing on her part, to be fair)/

'Pigeonhole' was a stand out amongst the newer tracks, but the tempo and buzz didn't flag all evening, getting better as things went along, if anything.

Crowd favourites like "Old Red Eyes Is Back", "Song for Whoever", "One Last Love Song" and "Rotterdam" were mixed in with less well known tracks like "We Are Each Other" and "I Think the Answer's Yes", but all were well performed and enthusiastically received.

The original set ended with "Don't Marry Her" and "Perfect 10", much to Mandy's delight.

They vanished for a few moments and returned to give us 3 more songs, ending with "You Keep It All In" and "Good As Gold".

You often wonder if a band missing a key member or two will be a bit of a pale shadow, but "The South" certainly deliver the goods and, most of all, know how to put on a show that entertains and engages an audience.

It was a bit of a masterclass in a 'feel good' gig and I'd happily spend a night with them again anytime!

So much so, in fact, that I'll go as far as to say I think you should, too!

Setlist

Stick It In And Turn It
From Under The Covers
This Will Be Our Year
A Little Time
Prettiest Eyes
Pigeonhole
Old Red Eyes Is Back
I Think The Answers Yes
Second Coming
Song For Whoever
We Are Each Other
One Last Love Song
Dream A Little Dream(Papa's Culture cover)
Pretenders To The Throne
Rotterdam
36D
Don't Marry Her
Perfect 10

Encore:
Woman In The Wall
You Keep It All In
Good As Gold

Finally a word on the support act, "Steel Threads". It's usually a thankless task being a Support Act, but they were engaging and entertaining (asking the audience for requests of covers as well as doing their own material). Laura is a great fiddle player (although I'll concede I've not spent a lot of time listening to fiddling) and also a lovely singer. Their cover of The White Stripes "Seven Nation Army" being excellent (I heard the lyrics for the first time!), but they were very good value all round!

Lloyd Cole and the Leopards - Shepherds Bush O2, 31st January 2014

A lot of the music I listened to in the 80s was, I can now see, a bit rubbish,

but Lloyd Cole and the Commotions were most definitely not.

As the years roll by, I find myself listening to stuff I used to listen to with new ears and some gets the thumbs up, some new regard and some quietly filed under 'best forgotten'.

The first two Lloyd Cole and the Commotions albums were big favourites of mine and I've gone back to them many times over the years and never come away feeling they were anything other than quality music that continues to stand the test of time.

Oddly though, I lost touch with Lloyd Cole (musically) after the Commotions broke up and it was only an idle Googling moment that revealed he'd been busy in the intervening years.

Some online listening led me to discover he was playing Shepherds Bush (my favourite London venue) on 31st January and I booked a ticket well ahead.

When the evening rolled around, it was going to be hectic as I later booked a skiing holiday departing from Gatwick early the next morning, but after toying with the idea of trying to sell my ticket I drove up to Shepherds Bush and walked from Westfield to the O2.

I can't even remember now if there was a support act, which, if there was, is probably an indication of how memorable they were!

Cole's live performances (I'd discovered) in recent years tended to be acoustic solo affairs and it had been some years since he'd performed with a full band, so this tour was a new experience for many of the, many, hardcore Lloyd Cole fans there.

The venue was full and many of those around me clearly knew all the songs, whereas I was only familiar with about a half.

It started well, for all of us, with the iconic "Rattlesnakes", which was performed in rousing fashion, setting the tone for the evening (Lloyd's birthday it transpired).

Lloyds laconic voice ran through all the songs, but, on the whole, the Commotion era songs were faster tempo and more upbeat, the work of an angst young man, rather than the later songs, which echoed of experience some bitter, some sweet. It was no surprise that the mainly middle-aged audience were lapping it up.

Favourites, of course, for me were the Commotion songs, "Perfect Skin", "Lost Weekend", "Forest Fire" (the encore finale) and "Rattlesnakes", but "What's Wrong With This Picture?", "Myrtle & Rose", "Tried To Rock" and "Women's Studies" were unfamiliar to me, but stood out as great tracks.

Even with an early start the next day, to go Skiing in Wengen (I know, life's hard...), it was well worth making the trip to see Lloyd Cole at Shepherds Bush. The Commotion era tracks I knew were great and I came away with a much broader knowledge of his work and even a few new favourites (and a few weeks later, a few new CDs in my collection).

Setlist

Rattlesnakes
Weeping Wine
Sweetheart
Opposites Day
That's Alright
Perfect Blue
Another Lover
Blue Like Mars
Period Piece
Brand New Friend
Women’s Studies
Perfect Skin
Myrtle and Rose
My Alibi
Tried to Rock
What's Wrong With This Picture?
Lost Weekend
Missing
No Blue Skies
Jennifer She Said

Encore:
Like Lovers Do
Forest Fire

The Rutles - Farnham Maltings, 23rd May 2014

The Rutles was a spoof span out of Rutland Weekend TV, itself a spin-off of from Monty Python's Flying Circus.

What lifted it above a lot of music 'spoofs' was Neil Innes' (sometime of the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band and various other projects) remarkable gift for crafting songs which so closely resemble Beatles songs that you sometimes find yourself wondering if you're listening to a Beatles song or one of his.

At the time "The Rutles" was aired, I was a huge Beatles fan (even though I'm a generation too old to remember them in their heyday) and, such was the skill of the song writing and performing and clear affection for the originals, I loved "The Rutles".

I bought the album at the time and a few years ago I picked up a VHS copy of the TV programme, but I was amazed when I saw an email saying "The Rutles" were performing at Farnham Maltings as part of a small tour.

I was a bit sceptical at first, wondering if this was a 'tribute' band, but, no, Innes was front (along with the drummer, John Halsey - AKA Barry Wom) and centre of the project, so I snapped up a ticket.

The audience wasn't huge, although nearly all the seats at the back were taken (An indication of the average age there, I suspect), with a smattering of people standing at the front.

The band arrived and, if I'm honest, it really bought home how long ago The Rutles was, as Neil Innes is, dare I say it, quite portly and shaven headed these days, I expected the trim handsome chap I remembered.

Still, no matter, I was quite different back in the day too and as soon as they started playing the years rolled away.

They started with "We've Arrived" and then rattled through a good number of the tracks from the original TV programme/album and the later, possibly cleverer, Archaeology, which had been released to coincide with the Beatles "Anthology" TV series and album.

The band were all gifted musicians and Innes and Halsey introduced "Rutles" like humour to the event, with their "Sponsors' jingles" and banter.

As things went along, both the band and the audience seemed to warm up and some of the tracks were absolutely epic with "Piggy in the Middle" (Clearly 'inspired' by "I am the Walrus") being particularly good, but I struggle to think of a duffer either in the original material or the on-the-night performance.

Paul McCartney's certainly not this good any more!

Barry Wom (or "Wom.I.Am" as he apparently likes to be known now) also got to perform ("make Mouth noises", as Innes described it) his hits of "Living in Hope" and "Rendevous" (You'll know what they parody if you listen to them - and very well they do, too).

There was a short interval (none of us is getting any younger) following "Love Life" (another cracking performance) and then they returned to give us "Shangri-La", with it's very "Hey Jude like ending, where Innes asked us all to get out our mobile phones and wave them 'lighter like' ("no matter what the house rules, say!"), "Double Back Alley" and then a few "Rock 'n Roll" numbers from the "Hamburger Years", including "Goose Step Mama" with the immortal line "You've got nothing to eins, zwei, drei, fear".

They finished on "Get up and Go", the song, apparently, that Lennon thought was a 'little too close to the real thing' and didn't originally feature on the album (although not at Lennon's request, according to Neil Innes) which was a great track, but really is VERY close to "Get Back".

There was no pretence of leaving and coming back "It's all too exhausting", but Innes asked if we wanted one or two more songs and was cheered to the rafters (Farnham Maltings really has rafters!).

The 'encore' consisted of George Harrison's "All Things Must Pass" (following a touching tribute to the Beatle, who had helped the TV project considerable, getting talking heads like Mick Jagger and Paul Simon involved), Eine Kleine Middle Klasse Musik (very apt in Farnham) and finishing on the nostalgic "Back in '64", which was probably the perfect way to end a brilliant night.

We'll never see the Beatles again and, I suspect, this tour may well be the Rutles swangsong (not least because Innes has so many other projects), but they certainly didn't go out with a whimper.

A great evening's entertainment - Thanks Dirk and Wom!

Setlist from Newcastle, but I'm pretty sure it's the same:

We've Arrived! (And to Prove It We're Here)
It's Looking Good
Hold My Hand
I Must Be in Love
Good Times Roll
Absurd Reductions At Fiasco
Cock A Doodle 'Tatoes
Four In One Hand Floss
Major Happy's Up and Coming Once Upon a Good Time Band
Rendezvous
Questionnaire
With a Girl Like You
Ouch!
Lonely-Phobia
Another Day
Piggy in the Middle
Living in Hope
Love Life

Absurd Reductions At Fiasco
Four In One Hand Floss
Shangri-La (including Cock A Doodle 'Tatoes)
Doubleback Alley
Goose-Step Mama
Hey Mister!
I Love You
Easy Listening
Cheese and Onions
Joe Public
Eine Kleine Middle Klasse Musik
Get Up and Go

Encore:
All Things Must Pass (George Harrison cover)
Let's Be Natural
Back in '64

Milton Jones, On The Road - Salisbury City Hall, 4th April 2013

My son had really enjoyed Milton Jones when we'd seen him at Basingstoke and wanted to go and see him again.

Due to his popularity, the closest we could get tickets was Salisbury (only about 40 miles away, so not too bad).

We arrived early, found the City Hall (not the impressive gothic structure you might imagine, but a bland 70s sports hall type building just off a street) and then had a quick meal in the nearby Weatherspoons.

On returning, we queued for the toilets and then made our way in to the hall, which looked even more like a sports hall. Our seats (in row J) were 'flat seating', but fortunately the view of the stage was pretty decent and we had no problem seeing and hearing the performance. There were rows of terraced seats further back, but they were some way from the front.

As at Basingstoke, "Milton's grandfather" appeared first (on a scooter!) and ran through a brief, but funny and highly Milton-esque, set.

He left and was replaced by James Adcaster, who was amusing, but not hilarious (other reviews I've read have been far harsher), although his final joke was almost worth the set on its own, I felt and then we got an intermission.

City Hall's facilities are pretty limited, so we didn't bother leaving our seats and fairly soon, everyone was back for Milton.

To his credit, none of the material seemed to have been reused from his previous tour and most was typical Milton, punny, funny and often very clever.

The joke about "Fernando" sticks in my mind, but as always they came at you like bullets from a Gatling gun, so not all hit hard enough to register before the next arrived.

There was a slightly odd interaction at the end where Milton picked up some items off the stage and read a letter from 'a member of the audience'. His response to it struck me as rather cruel and not very Milton Jones like at all. I'm unsure if this was a real letter or part of the show, but it didn't strike me as funny at all and was either misjudged or just a bit nasty, depending on which it was.

Overall, though, Milton Jones delivered another impressive performance, although I have to say (even ignoring the letter incident) I wasn't quite as enthusiastic at the end as I had been at Basingstoke, maybe there's only so much of relentless one liners I can take.

Ryan, my son, really enjoyed it though as did most of the audience, it seemed, and I would certainly go and see Milton Jones again, but maybe I'd leave it a few years next time.

Polica, Shepherd's Bush 21st March 2013

Having seen Polica perform a track on Later With Jools Holland, I'd bought their album and when I found out they were performing live at Shepherd's Bush (a favourite venue of mine) I got myself and my daughter a couple of tickets.

I was intrigued to see how they delivered the unique sound of the album (produced partly through a distinctly non-Cowellesque use of the Autotune).

We turned up early and had a quick drink in the pub next door before using my O2 phone to jump the queue (worth getting a PAYG sim in an old phone just for that :D).

First up, about 8 was Barbarosa, who looked worringly like a grunge duo, but produced an interesting (and highly complimentary) performance, I especially enjoyed the Terrence Trent D'Arby cover (as did my daughter as Wishing Well was a song we often played in the car when she was young).

After the near obligatory hour's delay and the venue feeling almost to bursting point, Darkstar appeared.

The lineup consisted of the singer, Channy Leaneagh, two drummers (their USP) and a guitarist.

If I'm honest I thought they took a little time to hit their stride and Channy Leaneagh seemed to agree, apologising (far too much, I thought) for their performance.

They opened with the awesome Darkstar, a bizarre choice, I thought, especially as the lacklustre performance meant it seemed to come and go almost unnoticed.

However, as the evening progressed, they seemed to warm up. Channy was constantly, it seemed, unhappy with something as she continually fiddled with settings on the (I presume) Autotune, but the confidence of their performance seem to build and by about half way they were nailing it.

The set was pretty much the first album, with a couple of new, but very similar, tracks.

The effective use of two drummers was great really driving the beats through your body.

Channy's performance was impressive too after a faltering start. I heard someone leaving saying "She really hit every note", to which someone replied "Yeah, but she could have missed every word".

It's true, Polica is a sound and a feeling (My daughter said it was like a Pulse, the way the drums impact you) rather than lyrics you can relate to (or even hear, live especially).

Enjoyable by the end, but a little unsteady at the start, would be my summary.

I would certainly say they were worth seeing though.

Peter Hook and the Light - Koko, Camden - 17th January 2013

Is New Order, New Order without Peter Hook?

Photos by Gaëlle Beri

Well I'd been pretty impressed with their performance at Brixton Academy last year, but when I saw Hooky and his new band, 'The Light' were performing the first two New Order albums at Koko in Camden, I decided it would be interesting to go and see him at work.

Koko was the Camden Pally and is quite an attractive venue inside with lots of ornamentation, typical of a Victorian music hall, but with the usual collection of modernity a venue that is, presumably, more often a nightclub than a concert venue these days, judging by the layout.

Koko is easy to reach from Waterloo, straight up the Northern line, so I arrived about 7:15.

At 7:45, sharp, the support act, Modern Blonde, came on. I was a bit nonplussed by them. Perhaps they just suffered the usual support act curse of lousy sound balance, but they sounded pretty crap, to be honest. The audience was mutedly polite in response to their performance, which I guess gave them the benefit of the doubt.

After around 30 minutes of that and another 30 minutes, Peter Hook and the Light took the stage and launched straight into a number of tracks not on Movement, including In a Lonely Place, Ceremony and Procession , which was not a bad way to start at all.

They then rattled through Movement, an album which is often referred to as more of a Joy Division album than a New Order one and Hooky was certainly channelling Ian Curtis in his vocal performance, but then that's how the album was performed when recorded, so fair enough, and I'm not complaining one bit.

There aren't the same number of toe-tappers on Movement that there are on Power, Corruption and Lies and aside from the hard core right down the front, few people seemed to be moving much through the majority of the tracks.

I'd imagined most there would pretty familiar with New Order, but it almost felt that people were unfamiliar with the tracks as performed, although they sounded pretty much 'straight' to me, with few embellishments over the album versions.

Perhaps lots of people didn't discover New Order until Power, Corruption and Lies or a fair number of the audience were just out for a bit of mid-week entertainment. The venue was certainly full with the floor and the terraced levels above pretty jammed.

Eventually they reached the end of Movement and after a short break, mere moments really, they reappeared and started with Mesh, Cries and Whispers and the crowd pleasing Everything's Gone Green.

Then they were into Power, Corruption and Lies, which was clearly what most of the crowd were more familiar with and, let's face it, what most people think of as more typical of the New Order Sound.

From the opening bars of Age on Consent through to the soulfull last notes of Leave Me Alone, through the darkness of We All Stand, the poppy happiness of The Village, the Blue Monday-esque 586, the soaring ballad Your Silent Face, iconic Ultraviolence and near instrumental Ecstacy (which I always think of as "Moscow Gold"!) the performance was (as someone commented on Cardiff's 'try-out' event) 'tight', energetic and powerful.

According to a setlist I found online there was an encore, but the gap between Power, Corruption and Lies and the return was a 'blink and you missed it' gap, before they performed Hurt and Temptation (The setlist mentions "The Beach" first, but I don't recall this...).

They ended, almost bang on the 11PM curfew, with a rousing performance of Blue Monday.

This had been the one small disappointment (if you discount the rushed, Love Will Tear Us Apart) to me at Brixton when I'd seen 'the others' and Hooky's crew definitely had the edge here. The track was powerful, soaring and energetic - Everything I remember it being as a 20 something and not the rather sterile track that I'd heard at Brixton and it was the perfect way to end, although I did rather regret (see what I did there?) the chance for an encore featuring "Love..." as I feel sure that would have been brilliant.

Still, you can't feel short changed with 2+ hours of rip-roaring first class New Order and, even if Hooky didn't quite carry off the vocals the way Barney does, that's what we'd got.

Is New Order, New Order without Hooky? Probably not quite, and The Light aren't New Order, but they are 100% worth going to see, this was quality "Whatever-genre-early-New-Order-is" and if you'd gone to see a new band called The Light and they performed an unknown set like this, you'd be telling your friends about it until your dying day!

Roll on Low Life and Brotherhood!

Heaven 17, Bournemouth 1st November 2012

Heaven 17, originally half of the Human League (arguably the more interesting half) and '80s hit havers in their own right with, especially, the massive "Temptation".

My wife and I had seen H17 at the BIC a couple of years before with ABC and the Human League and enjoyed their brief stint on stage.

When they announced they were doing a tour (and coming to the O2 Academy in Bournemouth, one of my favourite venues) to promote the release of a special edition of their second (1983) album "The Luxury Gap", we decided to go along.

A cold meant my wife didn't feel up to it, so my 20 year old daughter tagged along and, initially, seemed to be the youngest person there by some decades.

These days Martyn Ware looks like a slightly portly Investment Banker or, possibly, Del Trotter's successful brother.

Glenn Gregory's famous blonde mop is long gone, replaced by a shaven head, but he's still quite trim and has an undeniable presence.

They were joined on stage by a waif like backing singer, another, quite young, woman on keyboards, a drummer and two guitarists (one a bass). They were all introduced by name during the gig, but I forget them now, which is a shame.

The initial set involved all the songs, in order, from The Luxury Gap. In a way, this was a bit of a shame as, with no support act, they launched straight into the excellent "Crushed by the Wheels of Industry", but I'm not sure that the audience was quite ready for it and, although there was polite applause, it was us, rather than Heaven 17 who needed warming up.

They then performed the slower "Who'll stop the rain" and "Let Me Go" (which built to an impressive crescendo), before the pacier "Key to the World" (remarkably apposite in a world gone mad with credit and instant gratification) and then their best known (if not, in my opinion, best) track, "Temptation".

"Temptation" relies heavily on the female vocal being able to hit and sustain the notes and, whilst the woman we'd seen at the BIC did a good job, the singer at the Academy was startlingly good! Glenn seems to get an easy ride on this track whilst all the vocal acrobatics are performed by the woman singing, so to do it justice it needed a great performance and that's exactly what it was. Boy, could she belt it out, but she avoided falling into the trap of just being shouty! A remarkably good performance, warmly acknowledged by the knowledgeable crowd.

By now, we were up to speed with the band and another hit, "Come Live with Me" followed, giving us all a little breather, pace wise at least, before "Lady Ice and Mister Hex" which I understand they'd never performed live before this tour, not that it showed as it was great track, excellently delivered.

"We Live So Fast" was another great performance before the album tracks rounded out with a moody performance of "The Best Kept Secret".

Fortunately, H17 have more than one good album, so they were able to deliver us such classics as "Fascist Groove Thang", "Being Boiled", "Babies" (the latter two from Human League days), "Penthouse and Pavement" and a surreal performance of "You've Loved That Loving Feeling" with a totally straight faced Martyn and Glenn standing side by side to deliver it at, what seemed like, 3/4 pace, which was the first non-Luxury Gap track and bridged the gap between album and other tracks perfectly.

Apparently Martyn and Phil Oakey used to do this in the HL days and Glenn had always wanted to perform it with Martyn.

I've always liked Heaven 17 and it was a great pleasure to see that they can still put on a great performance.

Glenn Gregory's voice sounded as good as ever to me and the gusto put into the performance was gratifying for the fairly full house (Martyn Ware commented after the first track that there was a 'big audience', so maybe that spurred them on too).

At one point early on Glenn pointed to someone right at the front and said "We must have the youngest member of our audience ever here! How old are you? 10!", so my daughter suddenly ceased to be the youngest member of the audience BY a decade, although I'd be surprised if there were more than 20 people there under 45.

A wallow in nostalgia then? Yes of course, but, as my daughter commented, surprisingly good without that and still well worth going to see!