Ian Hunter - Friday 19th of October - Shepherd's Bush Empire

Mr Ian Hunter

Back to the Shepherd's Bush Empire for the second night running - this time standing on the floor. Whilst not full, a healthy crowd turned up to see Mr Hunter play a selection of material from his solo albums and some Mott The Hopple material as well. For man well into his 70s, his vocals are excellent and the band that he has assembled are very competent. Ian switched seamlessly between guitar and piano and the sonngs from his new album "When I'm President" mixed in well with the old classics.

To round off the evening it was no surprise at all to see his daughter Tracy and Mick Ralphs join the band for a rousing "All the Young Dudes". If it wasn't for the fact that we go away for the weekend tomorrow, I'd be back for the 3rd night running with Steve Miller.

Setlist
Comfortable (Flyin' Scotsman)
Once Bitten Twice Shy
Fatally Flawed
Wash Us Away
Just The Way You Look Tonight
23A, Swan Hill
Irene Wilde (first part) / All The Way From Memphis
All American Alien Boy
Black Tears
Just Another Night
Isolation
When I'm President
Flowers
Roll Away The Stone
Michael Picasso
Sweet Jane
+
Girl From the Office (snippet)
Ta Shunka Witco (Crazy Horse)
The Moon Upstairs
Saturday Gigs / Life
All the Young Dudes

Scouting For Girls - Thursday 18th of October - Shepherd's Bush Empire

A seated engagement at the Shepherd's Bush Empire and I'd forgotten what a good view you get from the 1st tier. After a pleasant enough warmup act, Scouting For Girls hit the stage to great excitement from the crowd. Playing a mix of material from their first two albums as well as from the new one this was a pleasant if not extraordinary show. Obviously the crowd reacted best to the old material and I'm glad to say a few favourites remain in the set - especially "I Wish I Was James Bond". It'll be interesting to see if the band can take their popularity to the next level.

Setlist

Summertime in the City

Heartbeat

Downtempo

Love How It Hurts

The Airplane Song

I Wish I Was James Bond

Famous

Snakes and Ladders

Rains in L.A.

It's Not About You

Elvis Ain't Dead

Can't Help Falling in Love

1+1

Make This One Last

The Light Between Us

This Ain't a Love Song

Without You

Keep On Walking

She's So Lovely

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!

Peckham Cowboys, Brijitte West, Gasoline Queens - Saturday 22nd September - Unicorn, Kentish Town




 

Brijitte West at the Unicorn

A trip to North London and a bit of Kentish Town we'd not visited before. A visit to a couple of pubs on the way was variable - one fairly hideous (The Gloucester Arms - full of flies!), one not bad (Torriano) - and one very nice (The Admiral Mann). A game of darts in the latter produced some very good scoring and even attracted an audience at one stage. Slightly annoyed I missed a double for a 14 dart leg which would have equalled my PB.

Anyway, the show was in the Unicorn - an imposing building with a number of stern looking doorstaff.  Once inside though, it seemed all that is good about a decent Rock Pub. Good stage and viewing area, reasonably priced drinks and a friendly crowd. The bill for the show was similar to the one we saw a few months ago and there was no admission charge - hurray!

In spite of our darts delay we were still in time to see the Gasoline Queens whose rock and roll set included the Stone's "Dead Flowers". In fact the set was very similar to last time, but sound quality a bit better. All in all, quite enjoyable.

Brijitte West was next - and playing an electric set for the first time we've seen her. Catchy songs, excellent vocals and a decent backing band. Really enjoyed her set and were able to tell her so afterwards during a brief chat.

The Peckham Cowboys were on last and despite the biggest crowd, were probably the weakest of the 3 acts on the night. Songs were OK despite a few technical difficulties, but another really short show (35 mins?) left us wondering if they simply don't have much material to play or just can't be bothered. It's hard to see how they will grow their fan base pursuing this strategy - indeed nearly all of the audience we recognised from previous shows at the 12 Bar Club and Catscratch Fever.

A quick pint of Estrella on the way back for the last southbound Northern Line concluded a good night.

Cold Chisel - Wednesday 11th July - Shepherd's Bush Empire

After a brave decision to meet in one of the errr.. most traditional pubs in London - The Stewart Arms (a mere stones throw from the Westfield Shopping centre) - average age of clientele 60+, we moved for a nice couple of Bitburgers in the The Bull - once of the nicest shopping centre pubs I know.

Having ascertained stage times and decided to give the support a miss, we turned up at about 8:50pm for the 9:00pm start. This is where the problems started. 2 of us had remembered our tickets and 2 hadn't! (guess who the gig regulars are!). Anyway, this meant I had to go into "dad" mode, explaining to the nice girl in the ticket office what fools my friends were (...insert your own Australian abuse here...) and she very kindly did some checks and issued 2 passes. Beyond the call of duty, so thank you Shepherd's Bush Empire (and apologies to those in the queue behind picking up tickets).

So, we missed the first 2 songs, but the venue wasn't sold out, so got a reasonable view in our normal spot by the left hand bar. Double beers were promptly supplied by he who forgot the tickets and we enjoyed the rest of the show. I found it a bit weird as I know much more Jimmy Barnes solo material than Cold Chisel, but it all seemed well received by the predominantly Aussie crowd. Ian Moss sang vocals on some tracks - he's certainly a bit less "shouty" than Mr Barnes, but Jimmy seems to get the better songs. Khe Sanh was a predictable highlight.

Anyway, after the show we decamped to the Walkabout (groan...) for a pint of Snakebite (double groan...). They at least had the decency to close at 11 (why?), so if was on to O'Neills for a nightcap of a lager variety. The normal bus combination home worked well, so a 1:30am bedtime could have been much worse.

Setlist:

Standing on the Outside

Cheap Wine
No Plans
HQ 454 Monroe
Saturday Night
Everybody
Forever Now
Yakuza Girls
My Baby
Rising Sun
Summer Moon
All For You
You Got Nothing I Want
Merry Go Round
Flame trees
Khe Sanh
Bow River
+
When The War Is Over
Four Walls
Goodbye (Astrid Goodbye)

Status Quo - Tuesday 3rd July - Kew Gardens

You know what you are going to get from a Quo Summer ""festival". A slightly shortened version of last years set, a great night out and rain!

Somehow, only the support band - the Straits - got the the rain. Pretty heavy it was at times too. They were pretty good (it's all Dire Straits covers), but a little self indulgent in places. They may well have done Money for Nothing and Walk of Life before we arrived, but it would have been nice to have heard those.

Anyway, we got down the front for Quo - having declined the £5 a pint Honey Dew (note to brewers - instead of having a slogan "If you like lager, try Honey Dew", how about a radical "If you like lager, sell lager FFS!"

A solid set as always with Francis on good form moaning about noise restrictions and overhead planes on a regular basis. A solid 8/10 from the boys.

Peckham Cowboys - Wednesday 20th June - 12 Bar Club, Soho

Supported by Brijitte West and the Gasoline Queens

Brijitte West - Excellent
Gasoline Queens - Pretty good (with Texas Terri)
Peckham Cowboys - Good, but way too short (20 minute set - taking the P... as headliners.)

Details to follow

Little Angels - Monday 4th June - Oxford O2 Academy

So, approximately 19 years after I last saw them, the Little Angels are back! Primarily reforming for the Download Festival, this warm-up show wasn't ideally situated, but Rich and I gambled on being able to get home via a route involving the Oxford Tube and the District Line via Notting Hill, thus narrowly avoiding the need for several nightbuses.

The Cowley Road area of Oxford isn't the best, so we headed to the City Centre for a couple of beers first - including a stop in my favourite Oxford pub, The Turf Tavern. A walk to the venue involved a successful (for me!) game of Bar Billiards and a snack from the local Tesco.

The venue was pretty busy. Knowing it would be loud, I was trialling my new "acoustic earphones" which turned out to be a little too efficient. The show itself was good and most of the old favourites got an airing including my favourite - "I Was Not Wrong". Sadly a shortish set couldn't find any room for covers - I'd been hoping for an "England Rocks" or "Won't Get Fooled Again". I've got to be honest though and suggest that good as the show was, it didn't quite match the anticipation for me that preceded it. Hopefully the band will continue though and I'll get another chance to evaluate soon.

Quireboys - Thursday 3rd May - Borderline, London

A Thursday night at the Borderline - a great venue to see a band like this, but arguably slightly too small as it will invariable be sold out which makes it slightly uncomfortable and a real "mission" to make it to the gents at the back of the venue and back to a spot on the floor.

Guitarist Paul Guerin and Spike were spotted at the Pillars of Hercules pre-show and we were quite surprised to see Spike with no drink in hand.

We got into the venue early to see Irish guitarist Pat McManus - ex Mama Boys - of whom I have a couple of dusty singles. He was pretty good, albeit a little self indulgent at times, but his Gary Moore tribute  Belfast Boy was excellent. Pat would also return later to add fiddle to half a dozen or so songs in the Quireboys set.

The Quireboys were predictably good. Spike pretending he was drinking diet coke (unlikely it would appear), but he did seem reasonably sober, with not too much inappropriate rambling between songs. Despite a couple of old favourites missing, it was good to have a mixed up set and to be honest, whatever they play will go down a storm in a small venue like this. Another good night out!

Setlist

Tramps & Thieves

There She Goes Again

Hey You

Misled

Too Much Of A Good Thing

Roses & Rings
White Trash Blues
One For The Road

Last Time

Louder

Mona Lisa Smiled

This Is Rock 'n' Roll

Mother Mary

Sweet Mary Anne

7 O'Clock

I Don't Love You Anymore
Dirty Town

All Right Now - Sunday 8th April - Half Moon, Putney

When we booked this, the show was meant to be "4 Bills and A Ben" featuring Quo's John Edwards. Not sure what happened thereafter, but it turned into a show from one of lead man Johnny Warman's other projects - All Right Now (a tribute to Free and Bad Company). Just as well we like both of those bands!

Unfortunately, we seemed keener than most. A sparse crowd (50-60 tops!) meant the venue appeared nearly empty. Thankfully, this didn't stop the band putting on a really solid show.

Jeff Rich (ex Quo) was on drums - I'd forgotten how short he was! The guitarist did a pretty good job, especially when covering on those songs where the original had multiple guitars or keyboards. Highlights for me were "Movin' On", "Wishing Well" and the encore - "The Hunter". All in all, a nice evening of good music (as always with Johnny), but I have my doubts as to whether there's an ample audience for the band to carry on playing shows in this form. I hope I'm wrong!