| |
Many
years ago a young lad stood among the crowd at a ballroom - that's
what they used to call them in those days - not a million miles
from Welwyn Hatfield and witnessed a phenomenon that was about
to change the face of popular music.
Before him, pounding out
a bassy bluesy ear-splitting set, were five young men in leather
waistcoats and white shirts. He didn't have to be genius to know
that this was something special. It was completely different from
anything that had gone before at a venue that had featured most
of the top names in the music world.
That venue was the California
at the foot of Dunstable Downs. That young man was myself -
a spotty youth who liked to think he had his finger on the pulse
as far as pop music was concerned - after all, he had the responsible
job of buying the new records for the jukebox in his local coffee
bar.
The Cali' as this
was known was run by the Green family, and they had a happy knack
of being able to book the big acts, often signing them at a time
when they were virtually unknown, only for them to be in the big
time when they made their Cali appearance. So it was that on that
particular earth-shattering night, hundreds of us stood and watched
in awe as a group who had just released their first single on
to the mar ket showed us why the rock world was beginning to take
a lot of notice of them.
|
|
By
now you will have realised that the group was called the Rolling
Stones. Messrs.
Jagger, Jones, Richards, Watts and Wyman hit us with a noise that
was louder than I had ever heard before. They didn't move about
a lot in those days, they more or less just stood there and blasted
out a string of numbers with such power that the floor of the
old Cali was vibrating like never before. Not many people were
dancing - most just stood and watched and wondered about what
was happening.
It's a long time ago now
- 40 years or so - but the memory is still vivid. I particularly
recall their rendition of a song about the Jaguar and the Thunderbird
and of course their new hit Come On which was much better live
than on disc. And the memories came flooding back recently when
I had the pleasure of seeing a tribute performance that rolled
back the years.
The venue this time was
The Stables, the luxurious nightspot founded by Cleo Laine and
Johnny Dankworth at Wavedon near Milton Keynes. I must admit I
was a little dubious about the thought of going to see a Stones
tribute band. I felt it unlikely that any band could provide music
of a quality and quantity to do justice to the originals. The
Rollin Stoned proved me wrong - with a vengeance. In a performance
that lasted nearly three hours they reproduced the Stones hits from
those early days right
up |
|
to
the time when Ronnie wood was drafted into
replace Welwyn Hatfield's own Mick Taylor. And the sound - obviously
not as loud in such an intimate venue as it had been 40 years
ago in the hanger-like California - was about as true to the
original as you can get.
The audience included
many people who must have been around in the early days of The
Stones, as well as some who were certainly n ot born then. We
were treated to a musical tour through Stones history. Of course
we knew these were mere actors playing a part - but they were
also talented musicians who re-created the hits with amazing
accuracy. The Brian jones lookalike - Byron Jones as he calls
himself - was frighteningly lifelike, if that's not an inappropriate
way of describing him, considering the tragic end of the original
Mr Jones.
Byron formed the Rollin
Stoned four years ago when he split from the Counterfeit Stones
- he had been a co-founder seven years before that. He should
be congratulated because what resulted was a highly professional
act that entertained, amused and sent the old brain cells on
a journey back through the decades.
Thanks men, it was a
great experience. Just like The Last Time.
Andrew
Wallis |
|
