Gig reviews & who are you going to see next (other than...)

[EastKentTaff]

Most deffo was not Reg, unless he has regressed to about 18 stone.. Still it was a good evening sitting on a terrace, temp around 18c at 2100hrs.

[Rockula]

So far I've sorted...

SATURDAY 28TH MARCH – Stiff Little Fingers @ The Roundhouse (with Neville Staple Band, The Professionals, and TV Smith).

WEDNESDAY 1ST APRIL – Vive Le Rock Awards @ Shepherd's Bush Empire 02 (with the reformed The Lords Of The New Church feat. Michael Monroe & Brian James, and a load of other people and an unnamed headline band, and the after show party).

THURSDAY 23RD APRIL – The Greatest Themes From Spaghetti Western Films by Symphony Orchestra and Choir @ Royal Festival Hall. Something different. Might go in my cowboy hat.

SATURDAY 30TH MAY – Rockswell Music Festival (in aid of the MS Society) @ Facebar, Reading (with The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing, Red Rum, Last Great Dreamers, Janus Stark, Healthy Junkies, Hell's Gazelles, The Suicide Notes, Trauma UK, & Haxan).

FRIDAY 3RD JULY – The Members, The Drones, Feckin’ Latchicos, RocknRoll Suicidez, The Wafty Krankers & Healthy Junkies @ The 100 Club

SATURDAY 11TH JULY – Johnny Moped, The Price, The Weird Things & Nuffin' @ The 100 Club

THURSDAY 26TH AUGUST-TUESDAY 1ST SEPTEMBER – Various bands you've never heard of at the Engine Shed, Lincoln during the Asylum Steampunk Festival.

FRIDAY 2ND - MONDAY 5TH OCTOBER – Great British Alternative Music Festival @ Butlins Skegness (Line-up yet to be announced except for The Exploited (who I bet don't turn up anyway) and the bands that won on the Introducing Stage in 2019 which will be Spunk Volcano & The Eruptions, Toyko Taboo, Desensitised & Rage DC.

[Uli]

I'm not planning too far ahead as usual.

The Franklys will be touring Germany soon; I laid my eyes on 2 dates: Tübingen on 28th January or maybe Karlsruhe on the 7th of February. (?)

While I missed the Cryssis show in Stuttgart last week, they'll also be in Karlsruhe on February 6th!
http://cryssis.de/

The Strange will supposedly be touring in February, but I've not seen any dates so far. 

Hugo Race Fatalists plan more touring for spring, hopefully this time with a date closer to my home.

TV of course I should see in April and (hopefully) in May/June. 

[Uli]

The Strange will supposedly be touring in February, but I've not seen any dates so far. 

Short notice: just heard about their gig on 15/2!

[Uli]

The Strange were great last night. Laboratorium in Stuttgart (eastern part of town) is a nice place, it's more of a pub with a stage though, which means it's seated - while that was perfect for the acoustic kind of set Distance Light & Sky played here last September (incl. Chris Eckman, who's also singer of The Strange), it's not ideal for "rock music". Never mind, I arrived shortly before they went on stage and most seats were occupied, so I kept standing (and rocking)…
(Later, some ladies got up and danced.)

I enjoyed very much to hear the new songs from the new album I'd listened to for months. The band sounded perfect (8 people on the small stage incl. a "horn section")!!
Audience loved them and asked them back for 2 encores. Glad I got to see them finally.

[EastKentTaff]

Not a gig exactly bur Stephen Morris (New Order) and then Tracey Thorn doing book readings at Faversham Literary Festival on Saturday (22nd)/   Ok Yah!!

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

Just popping out to see Elvis Costello's post-cancer comeback tour hit Nottingham tonight. I deliberately haven't read any reviews, but I've seen 4 and 5 stars being handed out...

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

Bit of a strange Elvis Costello gig tonight.

A two hour set was advertised, but he only played around one hour fifteen minutes. He also changed the set around a fair bit, totally ignored three of the guitars he had on stage (he usually uses them all) - including both acoustics - and played piano on a couple of songs. Worst of all, his usually ever so reliable voice was flat as the proverbial pancake on several occasions, including for all of "Green Shirt" (Boo! A great song) and "Accidents will Happen" where he sang both songs a full tone below the key the instruments and backing singers were using. On the plus side, I've never seen Elvis play so much guitar before and his Wah Wah pedal freak-out during "I Don't Want to go to Chelsea" was one that Captain Sensible would have been proud of. Unusually, it also took the Nottingham Royal Concert Hall crowd until the encores to stand up, and that didn't help the atmosphere.

Vocals: 3/10
Guitar: 7/10
Band: 10/10

Overall: 6/10 - As I said, bit of a strange night...

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

The local paper's review of last night's gig is pretty similar to mine if you spot the none-too-subtle references to 'issues with his voice':

https://www.nottinghampost.com/whats-on/music-nightlife/elvis-costello-returns-the-scene-3909089

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

Uncle Bryan tomorrow:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-8078211/Bryan-Ferry-review-Hes-relaxed-takes-jacket.html

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

A couple of great sets last night. One Eleven, playing only their sixth gig, opened the show. They were very well received, for such a new band, not least because Ollie Thompson was previously Bryan Ferry's lead guitarist. A genuine guitar prodigy, he joined the final Roxy Music tour at the age of 17 (having only been playing for four years) and played with Bryan Ferry after that. Alongside singer Fyah and a drummer, they gave us half an hour of guitar/synth Goth like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkkBPoWi2T4

...before popping out for a chat at the merch stand during the interval. They seemed like lovely, genuine people, so good luck to them.

After watching a very below-par Bryan Ferry performance on the telly on Millennium-eve (I was at home full of the worst flu I've ever had), I made the mistake of writing him off. He has since proved me very wrong on several occasions, and last night was no exception. At the age of 74, he and his eleven-piece band, played a storming, and especially Roxy Music-heavy (so I was a VERY happy boy!), set for an hour and a half. As the seated Leicester (De Montfort Hall) crowd got up off their backsides a lot earlier than the Nottingham lot did for Elvis Costello last week, I was straight down the front and centre and enjoyed the second half of the gig a lot more standing up. My personal highlights included an absolutely barnstorming "Like A Hurricane" and "Street Life", both with some great guitar work from Chris Spedding. OK, so you might remember him as a Womble, but he was also the Pistols' first producer and he took us all Motor Bikin' and Pogo Dancing!

A great night: 10/10.

[Uli]

Thanks for your reviews, Fred. 

[EastKentTaff]

Theatre tomorrow night to see Cabaret.  Anita Harris is it, although hopefully not as Sally Bowes..  although!!!!

[Uli]

Probably I'll be going to none at all in the near future. Events with more than 1000 persons aren't allowed anyway. Many smaller concerts throughout March & April are being cancelled by the bloody minute... 

[Rockula]

Not going to anything for the forseeable.

Not asking for refunds.

I can probably catch this thing and be fine but I live with an 88 year old emphysema sufferer.

I can't risk giving it to Xa's Mum.