Face Of Cheam

A late decision was made to go to the Childline Rocks jamboree at the Indigo, made only when Thunder announced reduced price tickets with no booking fee on their site.
Even with these late reductions and other two for one offers on Ticketmaster, the Indigo was still only half full, which was a shame. However, despite it being a charity show, the bill wasn’t really strong enough to justify the initial price of over £50.00 a ticket, so understandable as I'd imagine not many were aware of the special offers.
Despite this a fun night was had. Thunder, who helped organise the show with compare Whispering Bob Harris and his wife Trudy opened proceedings with a string four song set of Loser, River Of Pain, Love Walked In and I Love You More Than RocknRoll. Guitarist Luke Morley was in good form bouncing around the stage and the excellent sound system really enhanced their short set.
Fish was next up with three songs, the last of which was Marillion’s ‘Incommudicado’. Fish appeared to have a slight cold and his voice wasn’t too strong. Not sure what his first two songs were but a bit to ‘prog’ for my liking. After a short break and a £4 pint of Stella! Marillion did a four song acoustic set which was very good, although singer Steve Hogarth did wear a Tutankhamun hat for one of the songs.
I didn’t know too much about The Zombies although I recognised two of their three songs. She’s Not There and Time For The Season are instantly recognisable though you would struggle to get the artist in a pub quiz. Singer Colin Blunstone exited and was replaced by Russ Ballard who with the Zombies keyboard player Rod Argent were in Argent together. Russ who is looking fantastic for 62, is a well known songwriter (more later) and did a great version of ‘Hold Your Head Up’ though I was hoping for ‘God Gave RocknRoll To You’ which was missed.
Glenn Hughes and Ian Paice then came to the stage with members of Thunder. It was the first time that the bassist and drummer of Deep Purple’s Burn album line up had appeared together in 30+ years. Glenn Hughes warbled through ‘Mistreated’, great range but was really a painful warble towards the end of the song, and was then joined by Thunder’s Danny Bowes for ‘Might Just Take Your Life’.
Then the highlight of the night followed, with Russ Ballard returning with a great version of ‘Since You’ve Been Gone’ which also featured the lovely Tara MacDonald on backing vocals. Mmm nice.
Fish then returned for a Sensational Alex Harvey song which I did not recognise but was bit bluesy.
Another person looking fantastic for their age (59), Lulu, then came on stage. After ‘To Sir With Love’, she did a great rendition of ‘Shout’ telling both Luke Morley and bass played Chris Childs to sit down during it showing who the boss of the song was.
Finally, Roger Daltrey, turned up. He started on his own doing a track called ‘2000 Years’ from The Who’s last album. This was followed by the long version of ‘The Kids Are Alright’. This was great and featured Russ Ballard on acoustic lead during the songs coda. At the end of this song Roge handed his guitar to a roadie and promptly walked off. Luke had to run off stage to remind him that they still had ‘Behind Blue Eyes’ to do. Roger blamed his age warning it will happen to all of us. ‘Behind Blue Eyes’ was a slightly different version to the Who’s (or Thunders Cover) with an acapella bit in the rock bit (if that makes sense?). This also featured Tara on backing vocals. Roger then did leave the stage and did not return with everyone else for a finale of ‘With A Little Help From My Friends’. This was a little shambolic with too many vocalists but still fun. It also featured the two Marillion singers, Fish And Hogarth sharing a microphone.
Bob Harris ended the show thanking everyone and threatening a similar charity bash next year. A similar bill and hopefully a more realistic initial price and I could be tempted!