Friday 27 April 2001, Bedford Esquires.
I came into Esquires to the sound of The A Band, who were a professional sounding early 80's rock band. Their performance was impeccable and very tight, the members obviously completely proficient at their instruments. The bass lines sounded particularly good, especially considering the fact that the basist did the vocals at the same time. So far so good... but the one huge problem that preventsthis band from becoming big is the lack of truly catchy songs, as well as the fact that their music is outdated. However, they did bring an unusual proficiency to Esquires, instead of the usual plethora of rough and ready local bands.
As soon as Limehouse Lizzy came on stage, I knew that tonight would be special, which made the small number of people in attendance particularly annoying. The band played all of the classic Thin Lizzy songs and more. The first half of their set comprised of album material, the band even handling some requests, while they played all of the absolute CLASSIC singles in the second half. The guitarists reproduced the beautiful twin melodic leads of Thin Lizzy with great skill, and even attempted some classic rock shapes with ther guitars. The performance was absolutely electric, which made the lack of audience movement, apart from foot tapping and singing along all the more mystifying. OK, of course they were not as good as what I've seen of the original Thin Lizzy on video, and even though their frontman's great stage presence was far less than that of Phil Lynott, they were as good as a covers band can be. They could have moved more onstage, and did some classic Thin Lizzy onstage moves, but how could that be expected with such an uninspiring and small audience? If more young people tried to discover the roots of rock music, the band that inspired the bands they listen to now, then the attendance at an excellent gig like this wouldn't have been so fucking abysmal. Just goes to show that even the rock scene is trend driven, which needs to change for this music to get a new lease of life.
Peter Burov