Venue:
Birmingham Symphony Hall
Date: 13/06/2022
I had been waiting two years for this and then the next night another one comes along (Crowded house). The Boy named If is such a good record that the excitement had been building up. In March 2020 this was the Look Now tour – since then he has released two new albums and reimagined This Years Model. On the eve of this tour he also released Rusty – a 6 song ep he recorded with the Imposters backing him and Allan Mayes his singing partner 50 years ago in his first band since leaving school.
Anyone who hasn’t heard it should – it features Bob Andrews from Brinsley Schwarz on keyboard on opening track and Costello himself on fiddle on one track. All of this is by the way. Onto the night – they bounced onto stage at 8.45pm and launched into Accidents Will Happen except that the sound was muddy. I was fearful that the same problems they had in Liverpool on the previous saturday were going to continue.This is the Symphony Hall – the best acoustics in the country. How could anyone fuck this up? Thankfully second song Green Shirt was perfect and so too the rest of the night. Song 3 Either side of the same town is a personal favourite and his voice was excellent even the falsetto parts which he reached with apparent ease. Then by the 4th song we got to see how this group has progressed – an absolutely brilliant version of Hetty O’Hara confidential – extended almost into a swing time jazz number – the interplay between Pete Thomas and Davy Farragher was jaw dropping. And so the night went on – the highlights were very much the Boy Named If numbers – particularly What If I cant give you anything but love? This tour The Imposters have been augmented by Charlie Sexton, Bob Dylan’s touring guitarist who added a significant extra dimension. He even coaxed some half decent solos out of Costello, no longer the little hands of concrete.
We got a lovely Good Year for the roses with great keyboard motifs from the wizard who is Steve Nieve and a fabulous We are All Cowards Now and Mr Crescent as a fitting finale to a great show.
The Imposters are a fabulous Rock and Roll band and in Pete Thomas have one of the finest drummers around.
Costello himself was ebullient, witty and entertaining between songs – scathing about the Daily Mail and Rod Stewarts choice of Sweet Caroline for the Jubilee celebrations. He was also gushing about the Rollling Stones performance in Liverpool which he described as ‘fucking brilliant’.
The audience:
Reserved until the finale then raucous.
It made me think..
First saw Costello in 1978 and seen him well over 20 times now. The sound problems of the opening number are irritating and he is the only artist I have witnessed that issue with on multiple occasions.
It shouldn’t exist at the Symphony and to be honest the next night at the enormodome that is the NIA Crowded House offered perhaps the best sound for a live gig that I have heard in many a year.
Still I regard Costello as rock royalty these days and one of our very best songwriters. Still vital live but sort the sound out before the gig next time please.
Glad his voice seems better. My last 2 experiences of him and the Liverpool review, widely reported, did not make me envy your due diligence, but well done and nicely written.
Cheers for the review, Steve
Sounds like a great night.
Was hoping he’d play Dublin. Sadly, not on the itinerary.
US leg of the tour apparently features Nick Lowe and the
Splendid Los Straitjackets as support.
But hasn’t bad sound always been as much a part of his brand as the hornrims and too-tight suits? I saw him at least half a dozen times in the 1980s. The only time the sound wasn’t demand-your-money-back terrible was the show with the Confederates at – weirdly, because of its notoriously muddy acoustics – the Albert Hall.
Nice review , but yeah sound. Not just Elvis.
I mean they do sound checks don’t they? So what happens after that – someone come over and twiddle all the knobs on the mixer. Swaps leads for dodgey ones? What changes between soundcheck and walking out onstage proper?
I saw Robben Ford recently and the key box he had his guitar plugged into was rooted from the get go. Some sort of overdrive thing. Obviously only had one as he persisted with it while we endured squawks and crackle all night. From the first song. How can that be?
The ghost of Mark E Smith stalks many a venue.
Speaking of ghosts … ARCHIE !!
Is “Archie” the Aussie equivalent of the “Wally” people used to shout out for at UK gigs in the mid- to late-70s (possibly even later but I left the UK in the early 80s).
Oddly, enough can only really remember it happening at theatre shows
Be years since Senor Valparaiso was on here
The 90s misselling scandal piece was a classic and deserved its acclaim on the podcast.
Younger readers may not be familiar with Mr Archery Lessons, but us old timers miss his sage words of wit and whatever.
Archie has been occupied catching up with Justified.
“What changes between soundcheck and walking out onstage proper?”
In a word (well, two words): the audience.
All those fleshy bags of water absorb the higher frequencies, so the bigger the audience the more muffled the sound.
I knew it!
An ideal gig is one with no audience!
My favourite gigs are the afternoon soundcheck/rehearsals in the Baptist chapel on the Fens where I occasionally do the sound. Venue acoustics are such that I can hear the proverbial pin drop. Just me, my PA & mixing desk, and the performers.
Then, later on, the audience turn up with their coughing and shuffling and… breathing.
Breathing….bastards. You think they could hold it in for a few hours. Jonny Weissmuller used to.
(Possibly)
I have no idea why an audience has such a sound-deadening effect though. It’s just baffling to me.
“Baffling”. Very good, MC.
I was going to say that also but in theory the audience should make it easier to get a good sound. But it would explain why the first song is dodgy.
I neglected to mention that the support Ian Prowse was excellent – accompanied by keyboards and an fiddle player he rocked out and got the audience more than a little excited.
He is doing his own gig with band in Brum in September which I think is worth a punt.
Will everybody stop going on about Star Wars??
…oh… Ian Prowse…
Great review. Makes me want to go and see him again!
Thanks for the review Steve. Exactly mirrors my experience on Friday night in Bath, although I have to confess it’s the first time I’ve seen him live. Well over two hours, he seemed to be enjoying himself. Great band. Ian Prowse was great – was already familiar through possession of Pele and Amsterdam albums – as he said he wished a few more people had them. Apparently his quip about holidaying in Grantham wasn’t as well received in Oxford as it was by us Bath types.
I wonder does he just not bother with a sound check and he just assumes it’ll get worked out in the first 2-3 songs. I read somewhere that that was what Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers would do.
Which is pretty lazy. Macca does about an hour
I believe Springsteen is a long-soundchecker, too.
It all started going downhill when EC’s management foolishly outsourced the supervising of sound at his live shows to a company called Big Wheel
“Outsourcing”… oh dear…
Last time I saw them, the sound desk seemed to be to the right just off-stage – I could be wrong of course. The sound was muddied for two or three songs but I put that down to my ears ringing after a particularly loud support act. If true, that seems to defeat the purpose. Sound desk should be in the middle of the venue…tradition demands it.
That would have been the monitor mix desk.
In this day and age, it is possible to have the FOH mix done by someone on an iPad at the back of the audience, controlling a box off the side of the stage.
No stage boxes, no cable snakes, no desk. But where’s the fun in that?
A pedant writes: no dedicated monitor desk. The multicore has been replaced by a CAT5 cable and Dante box, but you knew that 🙂
It also denies a friend of mine his usual pre-gig joke of walking past the desk, tipping a wink to the person behind it and saying ‘Sound Man’
I don’t know how he does things now, but I know that years ago the band didn’t do soundchecks. They got their roadies to do them instead. One time many years ago I got to ride in Elvis’s tour bus and accompanied them to a gig at Norwich University. The band arrived literally ten minutes before they went on stage, and then got in the bus and headed back to London immediately afterwards.
If they were doing that back then, I wouldn’t be surprised if they got used to it and still do it.
fucking slack and arrogant
I find that upsetting. As well as finding it hard to not think all bands are pals who live together, like the Monkees, I like to think the band spend the afternoon at matinee cinema and theatre shows, or visiting the local museum. I am gradually discovering this is not the case as the band often hate each other, and spend the afternoon watching daytime telly in a Travelodge.
Nope. Not having it. All bands live together a la the beginning of Help! or, at worst, The Young Ones. This is my truth – don’t tell me yours.*
(*ironically I think the pre-fame Manics did actually live together. Oy vey)
Didn’t the Small Faces all live together in some house in Pimlico?
“Courtesy” of Don Arden
Don’t know whether they actually lived together in the house owned/ supplied by Don A, but they certainly hung out.
Generally by the ankle from an upper-floor window.
Arf!
….or perhaps AAAARGGHHHF!
The Smallies relaxing at home:
Bath gig sound last night was spot on. Elvis and the band in great form, loved the set list too. Even the support slot featuring Ian Prowse (From Pele/Amsterdam) was one of the best I have seen.
All in all a great night was had !