Classic Legends of Rock
Buxton Opera House - Sunday 9th November 2009
This was a bit of a short notice surprise really, courtesy of Big Ste. It was a good night and here's kind of how it went...
As it turned out, Big Ste's better half didn't want to enjoy an evening of music by The Strawbs, Martin Turner's Wishbone Ash and Focus, so I was asked if I'd like to go. I said "yes, please" and offered to drive to the Buxton Opera House where we'd be watching this evening of proggy-rocky-jazzy-folky goodness. The only band I knew anything about really was Focus, so I was hoping to be turned onto some new stuff other than the famous songs of the other two bands. I'd heard "Argus" and "Part of the Union" and all that, so I sort of knew what they sounded like, but other than that, it was going to be an education. Big Ste's big band for the night would be The Strawbs who he has followed for many a year, but has never got to see them.
I turned up at Chez Loxam at about 6.40pm and we headed off into the night. It didn't take too long to get there and it was easy to park up at the gig, it being a Sunday night and all. I'd not been to the venue before, but had only heard good things about it, so I was looking forward to getting in and seeing the place.
We arrived four minutes before showtime and, after a very quick shufty at the merch table, we went to our seats, which were nicely place on the fifth row aisle on the stage left side on the first balcony. The venue looked like it could hold a fair few people, but it didn't feel massive, mainly due to the fact that it went up quite a way! The stage was crammed with gear and it was all good and everyone seemed relaxed and ready for some tunes.
The house lights went down and there was a small intro before The Strawbs walked on stage and took their seats for an acoustic set. There were only three of them (Dave Cousins, Dave Lambert and Chas Cronk (as it turns out) and they launched into the first number "Lay Down", which I kind of recognised. It sounded magnificent and the vocals were great with some tight harmonies. This set the bar for the set pretty high and I am very happy to say that they blew me away. The songs were great, the singing was top notch and the guitar work was beautiful with some tight passages and harmony work between the players. They seemed to be enjoying themselves too, which was great. They were relaxed and having fun. The sound was also pretty good, although the pedals that the 12-string player was using did threaten to swamp the sound sometimes.
They played a highly entertaining set which, I think went on for about 50 minutes, although I couldn't swear to it as I wasn't watching the clock that closely. Dave Cousins did most of the talking and had a good line in banter, especially when it came to flogging the CDs that were available outside!
So, it was the first interval and I went for a quick breather outside. I saw the merch table was getting busy and thought I'd go and get Big Ste to see if he was going to buy anthing. We got outside and I saw that Dave Cousins was there signing stuff and saying hello. Big Ste got his ticket signed, then came over and bought himself a few choice titles. There was a CD on sale that looked good (and was only cost a Holy Diver) so I bought two (one each) and told Big Ste that we should go get them signed. I wanted to say "hello" too and say how much I had thoroughly been sold on the band after the show. Mr Cousins seemed pleased that I'd been blown away and Big Ste got a chance to talk again. He seemed like a nice bloke.
But it was getting close to Wishbone Ash's set, so we wandered back in to the hall. The lights went down and the band came on to a dramatic intro tape. Martin Turner wandered on in his 80s baggy white suit, picked up his bass and off they went. On the whole, they seemed to pass me by a bit. The playing was great, apart from the drummer who didn't seem to want to lay into it and push it all along, with some excellent guitar playing, but it was the guitar playing that did wander on a bit at times. This said though, the band showed that they knew how to entertain an audience and if there were awards for on-stage pissing about, they'd be winners! They were funny blokes, pulling shapes and kicking each other in the pants and all that. There was also tricks like playing each others guitars and all that and it served to keep the gig moving.
The set was mainly made up of a performance of the "Argus" album, which wsa a relief as I've heard that a few times before. This also saw the on-stage guest appearance of Mr Tijs Van-Leer who played some Hammond backing whilst the rest of his band danced across that back of the stage. This being the last night of the tour, there were japes a-plenty and lots of thank-you's, so this fit right in.
Then after an hour they took their final bow and left the stage and let the crew ready the stage for the final act. Wishbone Ash were alright, but didn't really capture me as much as The Strawbs had during their set. But they did put me right in the mood for the lunacy that would follow when Focus took the stage.
...And on they ambled with the house lights up. Van Leer wandered on looking like Bilbo Baggins in his bright waistcoat, big boots and white hair (there's a lot of that around at the moment) and his band followed on and you could have been forgiven for thinking that they were roadies, such was the unceremonious entry to the stage area. But as they started their set (house lights still up) with "Focus", all attention was on them. From then on, it was a full-on experience that would nearly blow my mind!
The set was made up of quite a few things I'd heard before including "House of Kings" and all that and also featured a totally spectacular "Eruption", which was nothing short of incredible. The playing was so tight and dynamic and pushed along at a furious rate. I just sat there, gob open, watching Pierre van der Linden on the kit bash the hell out of his vary basic setup, sounding like three men at once. He was exceptional and it just flowed out of him. That said, there were no weak links in the band at all. They were all incredible and played so damn well, each a master of his instrument. It was a pure pleasure to watch. Just hearing the differences between guitarist Niels van der Steenhoven full-on rock-out moments and his incredibly sensitive work with the Hammond in quiet moments was worth the ticket price alone!
The set rattled on and it was quite exhausting to watch and try to keep up with what the hell was going on. Wishbone Ash invaded the stage and upped the ante with a shopping trolley and dropped trousers, which was amusing. Each band member took a solo and after Van Leer played some lovely quiet stuff, it was off into the final frenzy of "Hocus Pocus". The high vocals were left to the audience, who also couldn't make those glass-piercing screams, so it was don on guitars with laughs from the band. It was fast too. Very fast. But it never turned into mush or fell apart. There was a drum solo towards the end, which did test the patience as the man had more than proved his worth and made me feel totally inadequate already!
Basically, to put it bluntly, Focus blew my tiny fucking mind!
Then it was over and the whole line-up and crew (apart from the mysterious disappearance of Dave Cousins) were on stage taking bows and thanking the audience for coming and supporting the tour. The lights came up and we filed out. I was going to buy the new Focus live CD and get it signed, but they were charging twenty bloody notes for it, so I thought that they could shove that for being cheeky bastards. After all, The Strawbs thing only cost a fiver! So it was off to the car and the drive back to Big Ste's house and then home listening to my new CD, quietly buzzing after a night of great music.
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© 2006 Graham T. Ebbrell