Gig review: GRAHAM BONNET – 02 Islington Academy 2, 1 December 2014

December 4th, 2014 by andynathan

For someone whose live appearances have been sporadic in his home country over the years, it was a surprise to see Graham Bonnet doing a second tour of 2014. Unfortunately allied to timing it in the busiest period of the year for gigs it may also have had the effect of driving down the numbers, and the gig was downsized from the main Islington Academy to the smaller and less salubrious Academy 2. Incidentally the crowd was one of the most mature since I went to Crosby Stills and Nash last year and I must have been one of the few punters under 50.

There were two excellent if contrasting supports. The David Sinclair Four are a side project for the eponymous respected rock critic, but are no vanity project. Instead they mix the blues – with guitarist Geoff Peel showing his paces on ‘Life Gone Cold’ -with punchy songs laced with humour, and I got the impression they would have been huge on the pub rock scene of the seventies.

I found myself highly impressed with them, David’s casual and at times almost spoken word singing style illuminating the likes of ‘Going Off The Rails’, before they closed with a fun cover of Chuck Berry’s ‘Let It Rock’.

Morpheus Rising are an altogether heavy proposition but the way the Northerners mixed the powerful, precise vocal range of singer Si Wright with clinical, tight twin guitars reminded me of Queensryche at their earlier best. Opener ‘Looking For Life’ and ‘Day Number One’ were particularly impressive and ‘Fighting Man’ even led me to make comparisons with Maiden.

Some of the influences they claim on their website – goth, thrash – I could not detect at all. Instead they came over as very solid metal with a slight progressive edge. A completely new name to me, they are definitely one to watch if they can get on good support slots such as this.

The disadvantage of two support bands is the pressure it places on time, especially with a curfew, so it was worrying that it was nearly 10pm before Graham Bonnet’s new, primarily American band (with that rarity, a woman bassist in Beth-Ami Heavenstone) played an intro before the man himself came on stage, in trademark shades and a bizarre matching beige shirt and tie straight out of a 1970’s Open University broadcast.

However his trademark full throttle vocal blast was in decent fettle during a crowd-pleasing opener in ‘All Night Long’ and ‘Love’s No Friend’, although during both he held out the mike to allow the crowd to sing the choruses. His jerky movements, rapid fire stream of consciousness chat between songs and continued reliance on lyric sheets also marked him out as, shall we say, a character.

Last time out he was backed by a Rainbow tribute band but the sound was never going to be so authentic tonight, not least with the severe handicap of having no keyboard player. Nevertheless it was good to hear relative obscurities from his brief time in Rainbow such as ‘Making Love’ and a hard rocking ‘Bad Girl’.

I was hoping this time that he might diversify from the Rainbow material, maybe with some MSG, Alcatrazz or even his classic single ‘Night Games’. Well he did, but not in the manner expected, donning an acoustic guitar (or banjo as he called it in a Blackmore in- joke) and playing some new songs.

To be frank, ’I Thought They’d Always be There’ and ‘Witch Wood’ sounded unfocused and a bit of a mess, while a Beatles cover ‘Eight Days A Week’ which would normally be unnecessary was a pleasant change. ‘The Mirror Lies’ was the pick of the new songs although I did wonder whether his full on singing style suited it.

After a band instrumental he returned on stage to sing ‘Since You’ve Been Gone’, bringing on a fellow former Rainbow singer in Doogie White, who is a ubiquitous figure at London gigs for an unspecified role, then ‘Lost In Hollywood’ was highly enjoyable and even if lacking in the necessary subtlety, his band and notably guitarist Conrado Pesinato did a respectable job.

However at barely an hour that was the end of the set and despite the crowd hanging round for several minutes, there was no encore, nor even apology that the curfew had been exceeded. It was a patchy display that did not rank alongside his gig at the Garage in the spring, and on this occasion the two support bands had rather stolen the show.

Review and photos by Andy Nathan

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