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Nick Morgan and crew
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Concert
Review by Nick Morgan |
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ALABAMA 3 ACOUSTIC The 100 Club, London,
April 4th 2007 |
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It’s
been quite a while since we’ve heard much
of the Alabama
3 - apparently they’ve been locked
away in a studio making a new album (“some
great tunes, gotta say” says my inside source).
And they’ve hardly been on stage, and at the
moment only have a few random gigs planned for the
later this year. But that hasn’t stooped the
indefatigable Rob Spragg, aka Robert
Love, aka Larry Love, from continuing to gig
with his slimmed down version of the band, Alabama
3 Acoustic, sometimes known as the Larry Love Showband.
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last saw them about three years ago at Dingwalls
– a marvellous night of red wine and dancing,
so with a free Good Friday night we jumped at the
prospect of another night of honky-tonk sweet pretty
motherfucking country and western acid-house music.
And did I mention that it’s a holiday? A holiday,
the first one of the year, and there’s a wonderful
Bank Holiday boozy madness in the smoke-filled fetid
air of the 100 Club (not
for much longer I have to add). Perfect. |
| There
are four members of this unplugged outfit. In the
engine room is guitarist Rock Freebase (Mark Sams)
whose open tuned guitar and delta style slide provide
the rhythmical backbone to proceedings – it’s
very crude, very simple (actually it’s bloody
difficult but you know what I mean), and very effective.
Providing the overdrive is harmonica player Harpo
Strangelove (Nick
Reynolds) and powerhouse vocalist the deceptively
diminutive Devlin
Love (Zoe Reynolds, wife of Nick). Actually
there’s also a lot of rhythm coming from regular
A3 backing singers B Attwell and Erroll Thompson
who toast and grime their way through many of the
songs. |
Rock Freebase and Devlin Love |
| Centre
stage of course is the laconic Larry (“Here’s
another motherfucking miserable song for all you
folks out there”) a latter-day Man in Black,
rarely parted from a beer or smoke of one sort or
another, who growls his way through the set. |
Jozzer stole the set list! |
Luckily
Jozzer – who managed to get back from his
costermonging in time to hook up with us and his
doll Trizza for a pre-gig Rioja or two and a
bite to eat - got hold of the set list before
the gig. Nice work Joz – but maybe you should
have put it back as poor old Rock looked very confused
without it. Anyway, believe me the Brixton mob were
in and it wasn’t a safe place for a little
black notebook – but fortunately I didn’t
have to attempt to remember what they played. I
do remember Larry thrusting a microphone in front
of my face and me saying (rather unpersuasively
I thought) “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash”
but the rest of the evening, strangely like a lot
of the Photographer’s pictures, is a bit of
a blur. Having said that, suspend critical facilities
– this is just about having good fun, which
is what we, and everyone else, did. That’s
what holidays are for, after all. - Nick Morgan
(photographs by Kate) |
Check
the index of all reviews:
Nick's Concert Reviews
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There's nothing more down there... |
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