with Rogers & Butler
The Tivoli, Wimborne Minster
Wednesday 5th April 2023
Colin Blunstone – lead vocals
Rod Argent – keyboards, vocals
Steve Rodford – drums
Tom Toomey- guitar, vocals
Søren Koch – bass, vocals
I saw them circa 1965, before Odyssey & Oracle, then I saw Rod Argent in the 70s with Argent, and Colin Blunstone in 2003 with The Manfreds. They’ve just been in the USA, and not only are they back, but they have a new album Different Game out too.
Phew! Look at my ticket, still valid:
The 2020 show was lost to COVID. It was rescheduled for Spring 2022, then cancelled for band illness. Finally, just three years late, here they are. People always ask me why The Tivoli Theatre in Wimborne Minster has so many good bands. It’s an eight mile drive from Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch, and a better venue at this size than any in the conurbation.
SET LIST
Moving On
I Want You Back Again
I Love You
Different Game
You Could Be My Love
Tell Her No
You’ve Really Got A Hold On Me / Bring It On Home
Dropped, Reeling & Stupid
Care of Cell 44
This Will Be Our Year
Time of The Season
Merry-Go-Around
Hold Your Head Up
She’s Not There
The Way I Feel Inside
The Zombies originals are Colin Blunstone and Rod Argent. If you have both of them, it’s The Zombies.
They’re very good. Like The Manfreds and The Searchers they’ve survived with pipes and talent intact, and charisma too. They’re also doing very well with Different Game as an album. Amazon had sold out when I tried on Saturday (I got it at HMV on Monday) and they announced it looks like charting at Easter weekend. They announced that they’d started rehearsing together in 1961, sixty-two years ago, though their first record was 1964. They’re NOT an oldies act either. The new material is fresh and strong.
They also have a tight band, all strong on their instruments and on vocals. I’ve always noticed how prominent bass guitar was on their records, and Søren Koch played beautifully, with a superb clear bass sound (not a given at the Tivoli). They added percussion in about a third or less of the songs, possibly a member of the road crew.
Wimborne Minster is the first show on the UK tour (full list at the end). It was sold out. I wondered as I went in. The venue had not been that active in reminding people with 2020 tickets, valid in 2022 and now actually in use in 2023. I thought some would have succumbed to old age or Covid in the intervening three years, or simply lost their tickets or forgotten all about it (we are getting on a bit as an audience). I phoned to check about using my old ticket and they found me online straight away and knew where I was sitting. I only saw one empty seat, and that was next to me. You do win some.
Moving On is from Still Got That Hunger, and was the official video track from that album in 2015. A good rocking opener.
I Want You Back Again is a deep cut in that they rediscovered it after Tom Petty covered it.
I Love You dates from 1965 and was written by bassist Chris White, who they said was in the audience. It was a B-side to Whenever You’re Ready in the UK. In 1967 a Japanese cover was #2 in Japan (and the Zombies version was #8), then in 1968 it was a US #14 hit for the group People!
Different Game is the title track, propelled by a classic organ sound. It sounds like a genuine Hammond to me, though it’s not listed on the instruments on the sleeve. It ends with the string section who contribute to the LP. It means that some stunning tracks which rely on the strings such as I Want To Fly are not playable on this tour.
You Could Be My Love is from the new album too. It’s an outstanding and gentle song, and was the first ear-worm from the album for me when I got the record on the Monday before the show.
Tell Her No, their second chart single (#42) from 1965.
You’ve Really Got A Hold On Me / Bring It On Home To Me is on Begin Here, their first LP. That would be around when I saw them, when they were covering classics like Roadrunner, Sticks & Stones and Going Out of My Head.
Dropped Reeling And Stupid is from Different Game. It’s a straight uptempo R&B work out, and none the worse for that. You can feel the musicians are right off the American part of the tour, and really tight as an ensemble.
The Odyssey & Oracle set follows. Rod Argent introduced it. They recorded it in 1967, at Abbey Road, right after Sergeant Pepper, and he remembers the budget as £1000 and that they rehearsed hard before going into the studio and cut it fast. As he points out it was a slow grower, yet now sits in many lists of the Best Albums of All Time (#80 in Rolling Stone magazines Top 500.)
Three songs from it in a row. Many long time fans asked for an ideal set list would say ‘Play Odyssey & Oracle” in full, then do Hold Your Head Up by Argent and Say You Don’t Mind by Colin Blunstone, then finish off with She’s Not There. That only takes us up to 1972 … fifty-one years ago. Yes, making all-time great LPs is a millstone around the neck for musicians. The good news is that songs like Rediscover from the new album take you right back there. They don’t play that tonight, but it’s a beauty.
Care of Cell 44 is the best Beach Boys track not written or recorded by The Beach Boys. It opened that 1968 album, and competes for best song the Zombies ever did. The audience loved it. It combines a jolly quirky Englishness with those amazing Beach Boys style vocals … it’s definitely in its own genre,
This Will Be Our Year always was a beautiful song. It still is.
Time Of The Season Ah, their other hit! Except it wasn’t a hit in the UK. It is their second best-known song, if not their best-known. That’s because it featured on the 1968 CBS sampler The Rock Machine Turns You On in 1968. It was a budget priced LP at 14/11d (75p) so under half the 32/6d for an LP. It charted in 1969, rose to #18 in the LP charts, where it stayed for months, with estimated sales of 180,000 copies. Everyone I knew had it. In the USA, it was a single and deservedly got to #3. It joins that list of major US hits by British artists that the UK record company decided not to bother with … the To Sir With Love group. That was the biggest hit of the entire year in the USA for Lulu, then the UK label declined to promote it as an A side. Time of The Season was released by CBS in July 1968, but copies that turn up are reissues on Epic from 1975. It brought the house down – the longest applause of the night.
Merry-Go-Round from Different Game is the one they put on the current Uncut covermount disc, so the first one I heard from the album. It names the tour too.
Hold Your Head Up was co-written by Rod Argent and Chris White and was an Argent hit. Here it’s sung by Colin Blunstone with exhortations for audience participation. It starts with a long contra bass sound which seemed to freeze the theatre clock next to the stage at 9.30 where it stayed until the show ended at 9.50. It had a lengthy and magnificent organ solo.
She’s Not There was the biggest hit (UK #12, but US #2).
They used it for extended guitar and bass guitar solos – both extremely good. That was the end for the band. Great song. Great band.
ENCORE
The Way I Feel Inside is also from Begin Here. It was presented with just Rod Argent on piano and Colin Blunstone on vocals. Just the two originals to end the show.
The tour continues:
Rogers and Butler: support set
They’re an American duo with a 2022 album Brighter Day, but were playing as a trio with their producer, John Piper, on rhythm guitar- an amplified acoustic. Ed Rogers sang lead vocals, and Steve Butler also sang and played a Stratocaster.
They worked hard and sang well, but had a hill to climb, because as I’ve often found, unaccompanied electric guitar doesn’t work as well as acoustic guitar. It jangles somehow even when played as well as Steve Butler does. That’s the issue with doing a support act where you can’t afford a full band – you need drums and bass if you’re playing electric, I feel. They also did the support error of only doing originals. When you’re a support with unfamiliar material for the audience, always put in an apposite cover. Just the one suffices.
Guessed setlist (40 minutes):
(I’ll Be Coming Home Till I Get It Right?)
Lovelock Bridge
Brighter Day
A Perfect Market Day
Olde Store Fronts (corrected)
Diana Dors
Desire
Brand New Tomorrow
That Rock Machine LP was seminal. There was a follow-up, nowhere near as influential.
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“Rock Machine Turns You On” was I’m sure the reason why Odyssey and Oracle took a year to start taking off. Once the sampler was out with Time of The Season, people got interested. There are only three British acts out of 15 tracks … Zombies, Roy Harper and Elmer Gantry’s Velvet Opera. “Rock Machine I Love You” was also a great album though (Stoned Soul Picnic, America, My Name Is Jack, More and More, Ain’t That A Lot of Love, Stop, You Ain’t Going Nowhere, Somebody To Love, Hey That’s No Way To Say Goodbye) , then CBS started doing double and triple LP samplers.
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The Rogers & Butler guessed track Corruption & Decay is the wonderful Olde Store Fronts from the Poets &Sinners album
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Thanks. Do you know what the first song title was?
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Sorry does not ring any bells. Off to see the them at Pontardawe next week so can’t wait to hear it
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First song title was Till I get it right from 2019 but not featured on either of the albums or the Ep
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