This sold-out show at The Troubadour in Earls Court was a triple birthday party for ALan Claytons 70th Birthday, ALan Blizzards 66th Birthday and the Troubadours 70th year in business.
First on were Electrics featuring the youngster at this party ALan Blizzard, right from the start Electrics were fired up on No $hiz they simply aren't taking any more, this is angry and rightly so, with sharp guitars this flew ALong. Suspect/Victim had its usuAL intrigue and Jenny Lane was pummelling her bass to get the paranoia across.
Thankfully ALthough he's 66 ALan Blizzard had no problems remembering the words to Remember, Robert Jones guitar got spikier, they seemed to speed up a bit. Thankfully Dead Boy wasn't about some band using AI to record with there original singer, whose dead, but had a dark edge to this nasty little tALe that had some crisp drumming from Mike.
Looks Are Deceiving you might of thought this was a scrappy bunch of old punks, who sounded nothing as vital as this performance sounded. Nite FALls was dark and sleazy goings on after dark. Think Ya ALl That was dedicated to Esther and her friends dancing at the front, who took it in the spirit it was intended in.
Jenny then brought out a birthday card for ALan before they tore through Lookin' Like as if they were a bunch of youngsters who like to believe they run My City with its Stooge like riff grinding away. Natural Born Killer was a sing along like normAL a highlight of the set. They closed with You Don't Know in a hail of guitars as ALan spat out the words and then thanked us ALl.
After a short DJ set by DJ Chuckles it was time for The Dirty Strangers to show age is nothing but a number, 70th birthday Boy ALan Clayton and the boys launched into Slap Bang In The Middle in this case it could have been about a tequila rampage, rather than getting caught out once more. ALan told us the next song was the title tune of the last album Hunters Moon and it featured more of a country twang as John Rollason played a twanging Slide guitar solo.
State Of Affair was partly about ALan wondering why he'd only had a couple of tequila's so far, John Proctor's bass rumbled along, That sexy minx put in an appearance giving them a Liberty Smile cheeky and a bit lowdown, AL begged her to Talk To Me which it seemed she was happy to do, they were having great fun onstage.
We then got Love 4 Life a song they don't normally play, it sounded good if a bit rusty round the edges. After some more Tequila AL asked R U Satisfied the obvious answer was yes we were, so long as they kept blasting out the classics. Of course, Pirates Don't Get Pensions was dedicated to his wife Jackie for helping him to keep on Rocking into his 70's. With storms raging outside Cold Night was ALmost like a weather forecast as Lol Fox gave us some thunderclaps on drums.
|
Got My Hands Up had at some point or other a good portion of the crowd with there Hands Up, caught up to no good again. La La La I Couldn't Care Less was the normal sing ALong as John Rollason's guitar went down low and they slowed things down a good bit, before the explosion of energy that was Bad Girls.
Alan explained that due to his lifestyle his wife Jackie also doubled up as the heroine of My Girls A Getaway Driver who was ALways ready to get him out of another scrape, they roared through this recent single. ALan introduced the evenings speciAL guest Flautist Charles Style who added a funky edge to a slow version of Diamonds that brought out more of the emotions in this song, a wonderful version. More flute please.
We may have been south of Shepherds Bush but we weren't South Of The River no matter how stranded in the deep south they may have been. We got the latest re-telling of how AL wrote She's A Real Botticelli in Keith Richards Kitchen at Redlands while they cooked supper together, before a romp of a version with John and AL really going for the drooling guitar to win her over.
It was then time to reveal the bands Christmas single and Alan Blizzard joined on third guitar for the rest of the set, for the first ever live version of Turkey Bones that took them to the purple hills for a proper chrimbo knees up, just beware of any wild dogs.
They then paused so we could sing Happy Birthday to the two AL's and Mr Clayton could down some more tequila and figure out just where Shepherds Bush City Limits were, not far way that's for certain, this had loads of gusto. We could then hear an old banger revving up outside in the rain, that as it screeched away was of course a Gold Cortina for us all to sing the chorus too.
They then closed the show with Ain't Nothing But A House Party or should that have been basement party either way they were ALl having a blast making sure to leave us ALl grinning. DJ Chuckles took over on the decks to keep the party going.
|
