LIVE REVIEW : RAY DAVIES AT FAIRFIELD HALLS CROYDON 10/10/2012

At first I was planning to go and see Ray in a more glamorous setting (the Royal Albert hall) but there was a date clash with the Joe Pernice gig at the Wilmington Arms (more on that later on...) so I opted for the Fairfield Halls in Croydon. The place was built in the sixties so it has this concrete "soviet-union" block look (not too different from the recently demolished theatre in Le Mans).

I arrived just in time to catch support act James Walbourne  who was playing with his wife Kami Thompson (daughter of Richard Thompson). They played a mixture of James's solo tunes and songs from the band they have together called The Dead Flamingos). James's guitar playing is really good but it's always tough to be the support act to someone who has written so many great songs.

After a break where the fifty plus age range audience was offered the possibility to buy some ice cream (rock'n'roll !!!), Ray arrived on stage. He seemed really happy to be there (quite unlike the last time I had seen him in a Spanish festival where he had greeted the crowd with : "it's not exactly beatlemania here tonight".  The first part of the show was an electro-acoustic set with guitar player Bill Shanley featuring Kinks hits with several requests from Ray for audience participation (how to ruin a song by Ray Davies part one). I was sitting beside an old lady who was perverse enough to sing out of tune AND out of synch with everybody. In the midst of old Kinks favourites (This is where I belong, Autumn Almanach, Sunny Afternoon...), we got the one solo song of the night (In a moment). The full band came in the middle of Dead End Street. Things started to go a bit downhill from there unfortunately. I think Ray was having difficulties dealing with the volume and there were a couple of songs where he really struggled to stay in tune (and remember the words also on Oklahoma USA). I think the only issue was the volume because Ray's singing was perfect in the acoustic part. Nevertheless we were treated to fine renditions of All Day and all of the night, Where have all the good times gone and Till the End of the Day. The gig had started a bit late so we got only one song for the second encore (Lola), instead of the usual three on the tour (Lola, You really got me and Come Dancing).

In the end a good gig but Ray would definitely benefit from playing smaller (but more appreciative) audiences where he could perform more of his solo albums and lesser known Kinks album tracks (not one song from "The village green preservation society" album apart from Days was played in Croydon)

LIVE REVIEW : NADA SURF AT SCALA 15/10/2012

Second time this year that I see Nada Surf and again they put on a stellar show. Opening act Ezra Furman had some good songs but his performance was a bit erratic. He did manage to pull some funny banter in between songs especially before he played the song he wrote on Kirsten Dunst. Nada Surf came on stage at 9pm to an almost packed Scala. Doug Gillard from Guided by Voices was still there playing lead guitar but Martin Wenck who usually plays keyboard and trumpet with them is off touring with Calexico. Set list was heavily relient on material from the last album and Let Go (14 songs out of 21). We got to hear a rarely played Paper Boats which was nice plus a nice version of 80 windows (I missed the trumpet solo from Martin on this one). New tunes from The stars are indifferent to Astronomy fitted really well in the set and you can hear that some of them are future classics that will become mainstays in the bands live shows (Clear eye, clouded mind ; Waiting for Something, When I was young). Another high point for me was See These Bones, I never tire of hearing that song live. Matthew Caws was in his usual chatty mood, thanking the audience for coming along to the gig several times. Encore finished with a stellar version of Always Love and the usual call and response version of Blankest Year.