Bad Company - Wednesday 11th September - Half Moon, Putney

Brief review:  More "Hart, 'Bucket', Davey and James" at the Half Moon. Very similar show to last time and none the worse for it.

A highlight for me was meeting Wimbledon Champion Pat Cash for the second time. He was kind enough to chat briefly about music and pose for photos with us. He looks annoyingly good for his age!

Venue and View:  Front left, standing

Robert Hart's Bad Company - Wednesday 1st May - Half Moon, Putney

Brief review:  Robert Hart, Dave "Bucket" Colwell, Pat Davey and Harry James make up this collection of largely ex-members of Bad Company and associated acts. Hart and Colwell have legitimate claim of being in the actual Bad Company of course as latter day members. And here we get the greatest hits of Bad Co with a couple of Manfred Man's Earth Band and Free hits for good measure. Seriously good stuff.

Venue and View:  Left hand side of the stage, a couple of metres back.

Robert Hart's Bad Company Experience - Wednesday 22nd November - Half Moon, Putney

Brief review:  One of London's classic rock venues for a classic rock band (caveat - mk 3 of the band with 2 members from that era). Bad Company with Robert Hart and Dave "Bucket" Colwell, effectively covering for Paul Rodgers and Mick Ralphs - both are called out in positive ways. Sold out, loud and excellent. They are back next year, as shall we. Some would say that we Can't Get Enough.

Venue and View:  Left hand side, standing.

Bad Company - Saturday 10th April - Brighton Centre

A Saturday by the sea for the reformed Bad Company and an epic journey due to "trains being replaced by buses between Three Bridges and Brighton". Joy!

Support came from Aerosmith's Joe Perry and his band and for once it was a support act well worth seeing as he ripped through material from his new album and some bluesey classics plus a version of "Walk This Way".

As for the main act, Paul Rodgers, Mick Ralphs (in danger of becoming my most seen musician of the year!) and Simon Kirke were augmented by a band including Heart's Howard Leese. The set was basically the greatest hits, although perhaps surprisingly, no Free material was played. Sound and lights were good and Mr Perry even returned to help out on "Rock And Roll Fantasy". All was done and dusted for us to enjoy a "Polish" pint on the way back to the station for the "replacement bus service" back to Three Bridges. Home by about 1:45am - lovely!

XCom - Friday 9th May - The Peel, Kingston

So are they "XCom" or "Bad Company 2008"? Neither if Mr Rodgers gets his way, dubbing them a "tribute band falsely using the Bad Company name" and threatening legal action. Either way, Mr Ralphs and co were coming to South London and it seemed a good opportunity to see what they could do.

This was my first gig for ages and the first whilst recuperating from a recent op. Therefore I needed to take things easy and was grateful for the relatively short set. This consisted of a smattering of Bad Company songs, "Can't Get Enough", "Feel Like Making Love", "Movin' On" et all and, bizarrely, 2 Free songs - "Wishing Well" and "All Right Now". Both classic songs of course, but a little strange given that none of the band played on the originals. All in all, whilst they are clearly not Bad Company with Paul Rodgers, I enjoyed the bands performance with Robert Hart up front and a fun time was had by all.