T’was a dark October eve when Glenn Hughes returned to Wolverhampton to play for us the songs from The Chosen Years tour. The air was crisp, streets outside the venue busy, and then there was me, at home, having managed to forget my phone when rushing to grab a bus!
Irked?
You betcha!
I use my phone for several reasons at a concert, be it cross referencing expected set lists,
sending myself voice or text notes, or looking up lyrics to ascertain a song title. Subsequently I managed to miss the whole of the support act, Sophie Lloyd, a British guitarist with a penchant for wearing entertaining attire! Perhaps given my aging heart and months of being single it was best for my health I missed her! Clint once said “A man has to know his limitations” which is why I’ve never flown off to Hollywood to marry Salma Hayek!
I digress. Having arrived back at KKs roughly an hour after I’d originally landed there only having used my feet this time as transport and thus roughly as breathless as Salma would.. (no no no Al, let it go!), *correction: slightly out of breath, having frogmarched through Wolves from one side to the other and back, I’m in and scoffing one of Pete’s famous hotdogs when Hughes hits the stage.
It’s a curious setlist with only one Deep Purple song, but several Thrall and Black Country Communion songs, a few Trapeze tracks, and an Iommi song thrown in too as well as some of his solo work. Given the last time he was round this neck of the woods it was almost all Purple I guess that’s understandable. It was interesting to see how his band coped with the switching styles, Trapeze songs being very different in feel to BCC not to mention “You Kill Me” was very Led Zeppelin “Black Dog” in feel indeed!
To go with this, there’s an almost subdued atmosphere initially, as if the audience are also indeed unsure as to what is to come, although this started to change after “Muscle and Blood” produced a decent solo. The funk from the Trapeze songs make interesting excursions from what is a reasonably sturdy older rock concert feel, although “Medusa” has a more Sabbath feel to it. “Chosen”, one of Glenn’s own has a decent tempo to it and I suitably marked it as probably my favourite track of the night. He’s actually at times sounding more like Ian Gillan than Gillan does these days and I could see him perform “Anyone’s daughter” happily! The bass line helps “Chosen”, pulsing and driving the track, and it’s very easy listening, especially so I’d imagine were you going 70mph on the m6!
Speaking of Gillan, another Trapeze song “You are the Music” put me in mind of a couple of songs from Jesus Christ Superstar in places. Entertainingly somewhere in the midst of the music I noticed the drummer is sporting a Wolves home shirt! Well played!
On reading back through all my notes it seems it really was the Trapeze songs which left the best impressions on me. There’s an acoustic version of “Coast to Coast”, not a song I know but the vocal is clear, clean and surprisingly pretty compared to the other songs, and it’s like running into a woman you’ve just noticed for the first time as something more than what you had been used to seeing her as.
Glen gets to show off a little here, hitting notes that belong in “Child in Time” 50+ years ago! It’s all very mellow which makes the BCC “Black Country” song something of a shock to the system with the contrast in style. It’s time for the bassline to shine here but it’s played at a slightly different tempo to the album version, and it almost fits to the tempo of “Don’t you touch me baby cos I’m shaking so much!” in places but again with Zep II influences. There’s even an opportunity for a decent solo here, and even a drum solo too which is always fun to see quite how well they judge what’s a good amount of time rather than overkill.
“Grace”, the Iommi track has Iommi written all over it. Sadly, this was cut short although I’m unsure as to how much we missed, as Glenn took a tumble which took him a while to get his composure back from. “Voice in my Head” has something more to it too, like “Chosen” so it didn’t shock me to see that too is a Hughes song. There’s still a little funk, but there’s even a hint of Rage against the Machine in the musical accompaniment through the verses. It felt like the band were comfier with this, which makes sense if for a lot of the set, for them they’re essentially playing covers.
Which… leads on nicely to “Burn”, which was always going to be the end song of the night. Glenn brought on Sophie Lloyd to join in for this and, in an outfit/pants so tight it probably needs a chisel and a blow torch to remove they belted it out together. The guitar work was eyewatering enough (but it could just have been the constriction from the pants!) and there’s no denying it sounded good, and in truth the audience reacted more than they had done all night, so I guess that’s a “well played” for the show planner.
Hughes doesn’t seem to be slowing down with his enthusiasm for the music. An eclectic 17 tracks and a trip (quiet literally once) down memory lane was absorbed and taken in by all who had made their way to KKs, with a calm appreciation rather than rapture and screamed superlatives which oft occur at other rock concerts.
Like having consumed a homemade Sunday dinner rather than a vindaloo, we left feeling full, satisfied, and most important of all, knowing we were not going to suffer for it and be sore in the morning!
There’s a “Burn” pun available there but I’m still too flustered to construct it
