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MANFRED MANN'S EARTH BAND
The Underworld,Camden,London 15 March 2004

There's a rush of great gigs happening in London at the moment and the promoter at The Underworld is doing a fantastic job. On this occasion a good crowd of probably more than 300 was treated to an excellent gig by a band with a long and prestigious pedigree. The venue was comfortably full without feeling too packed, but with only one poor girl serving behind the bar, she had a very busy night.

The support took the form of a female duo (didn't catch the name) that featured a double bass player and a vocalist/keyboard player. Their material seemed to be in a in the vein of early Tori Amos, but it was hard to concentrate fully given the talking going on amongst the audience. A good proportion of the crowd seemed to be fanclub members or family and they spent the whole of the gig talking amongst themselves. They may have seen the same duo performing at other gigs on this tour, but for those of us who wanted to listen, it was a missed opportunity.

Just after 9pm the Earth Band came on stage and began a good long set that lasted about 1 hour 45mins. I can't honestly say that I recognized too many of the tunes, beyond those that were hits or covers of Bruce Springsteen numbers, but there was a number of tunes that I would certainly like to revisit.

Given that they only played about 14 songs in all, it is clear that the band performed most of the tunes in an `extended' format, which gave the musicians and in particular, Mr Mann himself, the opportunity to play some extended solos. These were very tastefully done in the main, with just one or two outstaying their welcome.

In amongst all this there were a couple of tunes that I thought were quite outstanding. The first two songs of the set made no more than an agreeable impression on me, but 'Martha's Madman', the 3rd tune that they played, really made me take notice. A little later on they introduced a new tune, entitled Mars, and based on Holst's The Planets that was also hugely impressive.

The band's new vocalist, Noel McCalla was excellent, if a little under-used. He had that sort of great rock, blues and soul mix in his voice that I love in guys like Glenn Hughes, David Coverdale and Seal, yet he also even managed to sound a bit like Zack from RATM at one point. Instrumentally the musicians were great, spicing their Classic Rock sound with just enough Prog to keep me interested.

Of course the set just had to include standards such as `Demolition Man', `Mighty Quinn', `Blinded by the Light' and `Davy's on the Road Again' and with the exception of the omission of `Joybringer' I had no complaints at all. An excellent show. Look out for them in the UK again, this autumn, when they will be playing with Uriah Heep.

Setlist (approx) Spirits in the Night Castles Martha's Madman Shelter From The Storm Don't Kill it Carol Mars Dancing in the Dark Father of Night, Father of Day Demolition Man Blinded by the Light Davy's on the Road Again

For You Do Wah Diddy Diddy / Mighty Quinn medley (with a bit of Smoke on the Water thrown in at the end)

Review: Charlie Farrell