Gig review: THE QUIREBOYS- Boileroom, Guildford, 1 October 2021

October 5th, 2021 by andynathan

Quireboys gigs come in all shapes and sizes- including those rescheduled orchestral shows next year- but some of my most enjoyable have been their acoustic shows. Lead singer Spike also made the format work when I saw him on his ‘audience with’ tour earlier in the year, so with the gig scene resuming, an ‘away gig’ out of London in Guildford on a Friday night was enticing.

It brought back memories too of a favourite gig in the Surrey county town, when I saw them at the old Civic Hall in the spring of 1990. It was the height of the short-lived Quireboys mania, just after their debut album had somehow hit No 2 in the charts and they were Top of the Pops regulars. I remember buttonholes and pinstriped waistcoats being the choice of dress for both sexes and the floor becoming a mass of flailing bodies.

Those days are long gone, in fact they only really lasted a few months, and this gig was at the Boileroom, a new venue to me with but with an impressive roster of live music. A single small room, wide but only a few rows deep, it was packed to the gills out which was encouraging news, though for some a little scary with the pandemic still very much with us.

There was also a bonus of a support act Matt Mitchell- billed as with his band the Coldhearts, but in reality just him with an acoustic guitar and the voice that I’ve been a fan of for a long time going back to AOR hopefuls Pride. He always seemed relatively serious on stage so I was unprepared for him radiating a friendly bonhomie, just delighted to be on a stage again.

As well as Coldhearts songs in ‘Kings and Queens’, ‘Unavailable’ and ‘Wave Goodbye’, there were a couple of more unusual moments. He played a song ‘The Queen and I’ – written about the fact they share a birthday!- that he said might never see the light of day, and then he gave us a fielder’s choice for a cover of ‘Boys of Summer’ or ‘Paranoid’, the latter winning the popular vote and being a very unexpectedly effective candidate for the acoustic treatment. Ending a short set with ‘Black Diamonds’, which got rock radio play a couple of years ago, I was sufficiently impressed to buy the CD from the merch stall.

The Quireboys opened, as they would have done at that 1990 show, with a pair from ‘A Little Bit of What You Fancy’ in ‘There She Goes Again’ and ‘Misled’- I must have heard those songs countless times and yet they never fail to raise a smile, being the ultimate good time music. Except all was not well with the sound set up on stage and the band seemed a little distracted, despite Spike in typical fashion lightening the mood with an anecdote.

It wasn’t the full Quireboys line up, just four of them but it was very noticeable how this format puts Keith Weir’s piano playing right to the forefront of their sound compared to a plugged in performance, with the guitarists Paul Guerin and Guy Griffin in a lower key role.

There was plenty to enjoy, appreciating the quality in stripped down format of songs like ‘Devil of A Man’ as well a rare rendition of ‘Hates to Please’ (from the second album but apparently one of the first songs they wrote) and live favourites like ‘Mona Lisa Smiled’ and ‘Roses and Rings’, where Spike’s husky voice seemed even more whispered.

He was on typical form, leading singalongs to the likes of ‘Have a Drink With Me’ and ‘I Love This Dirty Town’, though his references to Saturday night showed a bit of poetic licence. At one point I am sure he also hinted they were going to play two hours which had me anxiously clock watching for a while.

However there was no danger of missed trains as the set drew to a rather rapid close. ‘Sweet Mary Ann’ generated a raucous singalong atmosphere, but the mood was tempered as Spike paid tribute to a sometime Quireboy in Darrell Bath who had recently passed away (these occurrences becoming depressingly more common). He said he wasn’t going to play the song but invested his trademark ballad ‘I Don’t Love You Anymore’ with even more emotion than normal.

That was then it after an hour and a quarter and with the venue instantly blasting out some recorded music I felt a tad short changed, but never fear, they could hardly get away without coming back to play ‘7 O’Clock’ to a party hardy Friday (not Saturday!) night atmosphere with some flourishes from Spike on his harmonica. It proved that whatever the format, it remains one of the safest bets in rock that the Quireboys will provide a fun night out.

Review and Photos by Andy Nathan

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