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.

Kenney Jones - Friday 3rd December - 229 Club, Great Portland Street, London

Brief review:  More from Robert Hart and Dave "Bucket" Colwell. Ably support by Pat Davey (Cregan and Co, Paul Young etc) on bass and Steve Smith (keyboards) they join the headliner Kenney Jones (drums) for a run through some highlights of Kenney's long career. As you'd expect, that meant lots of Who & Small Faces stuff with a smattering of Bad Company and Free material and other rock classics. What was interesting for me is that brilliant as Robert Hart is on vocals, he must have a bit of a mental block with some of the lyrics - some of which were either wrong or in the wrong verse order on some songs. Still, it's not like they have been gigging much recently, so I think we can excuse that in the face of how good the other aspects are. Ken is obviously a man of few words - a brief "thanks for coming" was as much as we got from the man himself.

Venue and View:  Front left about 10 yards from the high stage. Excellent view, but very sparse audience

Robert Hart / Dave "Bucket" Colwell - Thursday 14th October - Cavern, Raynes Park

Brief review:  What's not to like? Brilliant vocals, excellent guitars and some of rock's best songs. Robert also told a few stories between songs which were entertaining too, although hearing the nonsense that Angel was at Number 1 in the American charts for weeks (it wasn't - certainly not in a chart anyone has heard of!) once again almost provoked some heckling. But that would have been disingenuous as it was otherwise an excellent evening.

Venue and View:  Side view on the right, allowing an interval chat with Noel the landlord. Nowhere near as busy as two performers of this quality deserve.

Setlist

Little Bit of Love 
Movin' On 
Feel Like Making Love 
Davy's on the Road Again 
Natural Born Bugie 
Somebody to Love
Shooting Star 
All or Nothing 
+
Can't Get Enough 
Ready for Love 
Little Martha
Mr Brown 
Angel 
Ooh La La 
Sweet Little Rock & Roller 

Kenney Jones & The Jones Gang - Friday 26th August - Under The Bridge

Back to Stamford Bridge for a rare outing from the former Small Faces / Who drummer. With the fantastic Robert Hart on vocals, this was an enjoyable romp through some classic rock of the 60's and 70's. It was good - but far too short. Surely it would not have been much to ask to sneak in another 4 or 5 Small Faces and Who Tracks.

Dave "Bucket" Colwell joined in for the 2nd Bad Company song and the "Free" encore. Last saw him with Jim Cregan at Sutton United - perhaps he only plays football grounds these days!

Interestingly, besides the time I saw Andy "Thunderclap" Newman, I have not seen less interaction between the named act an the audience - Kenney did not utter a word in our direction. can only assume he is shy.

So, good, but was hoping for more.

Setlist
Can't Get Enough
The Time of Your Life
Maggie May
Substitute
Feel Like Making Love
All Or Nothing
Tin Soldier
Mr Brown
Angel
Itcthycoo Park
Stay With Me
Won't Get Fooled Again
+
All Right Now

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.