Cregan & Co - Friday 19th July - Boom Boom, Sutton

Brief review:  Another Sutton outing for Jim, Ben, Pat, Sam & Harry. A slightly mixed up set - still revolving around the Rod Stewart material Jim played on, but also with a few newer choices. See these guys whilst you can as they are brilliant. Hopefully the recent venue issues with promotion (or lack of it) won't prevent them from returning.

Venue and View:  Floor Standing. Half full, but then again hardly anyone would have known this was on!

Cregan and Co - Friday 3rd September - Boom Boom, Sutton

Brief review: Jim Cregan, Pat Davey, Harry James, Ben Mills and Sam Tanner were in excellent form as always for an evening of mainly Rod Stewart covers. There were (to our surprise), 2 new original songs, which were fine (guest Val Cowell adding some bluesy vocals on the first), but basically the rest of the show was a big sing-a-long. Just as you'd expect!

Venue and View:  Standing about half way back to the left. Pretty full!

Setlist

Downtown Train 
Forever Young
Hot Legs 
The First Cut Is the Deepest
The Wild Side of Life
You're in My Heart (The Final Acclaim)
I Was Only Joking 
Best of The Bad Boys [with Val Cowell of Bad Influence - Live Debut]
Anyone Who Knows Her [Live Debut]
Young Turks
Handbags and Gladrags 
Blondes (Have More Fun) 
Baby Jane 
Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)
Maggie May 
+
Have I Told You Lately

Cregan & Co - Friday 25th May - Boom Boom Club, Sutton

The excellent Jim Cregan and his band are back in Sutton for a fun packed evening of Rod Stewart classics and a couple of other surprises including a random Beatles cover! Still including Thunder's Harry James on drums and Ben Mills on vocals, a packed house enjoyed a raucous sing-a-long on most numbers!

Setlist
Baby Jane
Forever Young
Hot Legs
The First Cut Is The Deepest
Tonight’s The Night (It’s Gonna Be Alright)
Wild Side of Life
Downtown Train
Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)
I Saw Her Standing There
I Was Only Joking
Passion
Blondes Have More Fun
I Don’t Want To Talk About It
Young Turks
Maggie May
+
Sailing
My Way (snippet)
Twisting The Night Away (partial Harry James vocal)
Sweet Little Rock and Roller

Cregan & Co - Wednesday 30th December - Boom Boom Club, Sutton

An early "New Year" show from Jim Cregan and his band of merry men. A family outing for us this time, following the relative success of forcing the kids to watch Rod Stewart in Las Vegas. Here, at a packed Boom Boom club at Sutton Utd FC, vocalist Ben Mills let rip through a selection of Rod classics and highlights from "Family" (Jim's "other" band) plus Steve Harley's "Come Up and See Me (Make Me Smile)".

As ever. musicianship was of the highest standard. Drummer Harry James becomes my artist seen this year with the most acts (Thunder, Magnum, Snakecharmer and here) and a special guest appearance from ex-Bad Company guitarist Dave "Bucket" Colwell for "Sweet Little Rock 'n' Roller" ended off a great show.

Jim and Dave photo by Philip Crow

Cregan & Co - Tuesday 30th December - Boom Boom Club, Sutton

So, 2014 comes to an end with an enjoyable evening with Jim Cregan and his excellent band. A packed Boom Boom club the day before New Year's Eve witnessed 2 hours of mainly Road Stewart material (with Ben Mills on vocals) as well as a couple of other snippets from Jim's career with Family and Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel.

As is often the case there were some amusing anecdotes from Jim and it's nice that he still plays the actual guitars that many of these classic songs were recorded on. Go and see them during 2015 if you can.

2014 has personally been a good year for gigs, this one being my 38th of the year (probably highest total for 10 years or so) and there have been very few (if any) duds amongst them. Highlights included the classic Quo line-up "final ever" shows at Hammersmith, Ian Hunter at Brighton and the Bryan Adams London shows.

Here's wishing all readers a very happy and prosperous 2015.

Cregan & Co - Saturday 29th September - Boom Boom Club, Sutton

Jim Cregan at the Boom Boom Club

Having lost most of the other ex-members of the Rod Stuart band, the band which used to be known as "Apart From Rod" are now called "Cregan and Co". They'd also lost drummer Harry James on Magnum duty for this show.

This was the first time I'd seen the new vocalist, Ben Mills. A former X-Factor finalist, it turns out you shouldn't hold this against him - he can really sing!

The standard 70's Rod standards were performed flawlessly, with a couple of surprises - notably Handbags and Gladrags plus a bonus Come Up And See Me (Make Me Smile) which was excellent (Jim Cregan had played the original guitar on this classic hit). Another fun night at the Boom Boom and a band well worth seeing!