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Bebop Spoken There

Spasmo Brown: “Jazz is an ice cream sandwich! It's the Fourth of July! It's a girl with a waterbed!”. (Syncopated Times, July, 2024).

The Things They Say!

Hudson Music: Lance's "Bebop Spoken Here" is one of the heaviest and most influential jazz blogs in the UK.

Rupert Burley (Dynamic Agency): "BSH just goes from strength to strength".

'606' Club: "A toast to Lance Liddle of the terrific jazz blog 'Bebop Spoken Here'"

The Strictly Smokin' Big Band included Be Bop Spoken Here (sic) in their 5 Favourite Jazz Blogs.

Ann Braithwaite (Braithwaite & Katz Communications) You’re the BEST!

Holly Cooper, Mouthpiece Music: "Lance writes pull quotes like no one else!"

Simon Spillett: A lovely review from the dean of jazz bloggers, Lance Liddle...

Josh Weir: I love the writing on bebop spoken here... I think the work you are doing is amazing.

Postage

17372 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 656 of them this year alone and, so far, 61 this month (Sept. 17).

From This Moment On ...

September

Fri 20: Lindsay Hannon’s Tom Waits for No Man @ Gala Theatre, Durham. 1:00pm. £8.00. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Rob Hall & Chick Lyall @ The Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. Free (donations). SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 20: Leeway @ 1719, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. The Old Black Cat Jazz Club. CANCELLED!
Fri 20: Gaz Hughes Trio @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.

Sat 21: Jason Isaacs @ Seaburn STACK, Seaburn. 1:00-2:45pm. Free.
Sat 21: Vieux Carré Hot Four @ The Beehive, Hartley Lane, Earsdon Whitley Bay NE25 0SZ. 4:30pm-6:30pm.
Sat 21: Baghdaddies @ Two by Two, Albion Row, Byker, Newcastle NE6 1RQ. 6:00pm.
Sat 21: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Northumberland Club, Jesmond, Newcastle. 7:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Sat 21: Jude Murphy & Alan Law @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 22: More Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Jason Isaacs @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 2:30-4:30pm. Free.
Sun 22: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ Queen’s Hall, Hexham. 3:00pm.
Sun 22: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Richard Herdman @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 22: Remy CB Band @ Blues Underground, Nelson St., Newcastle. 8:30pm. Free. Remi, 2024 Newcastle Uni graduate, superb soul/blues voice!

Mon 23: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Paul Booth with the Paul Edis Trio @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £10.00. A Blaydon Jazz Club 40th anniversary concert! SOLD OUT!

Tue 24: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ Newcastle House Hotel, Rothbury. 7:30pm. £12.00. (£10.00. adv. from Tully’s of Rothbury). Coquetdale Jazz.
Tue 24: Sarah Gillespie @ The Cluny, Newcastle. 7:30pm (doors). £16.50. Duo performance with Chris Montague.

Wed 25: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 25: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 25: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 25: Moonlight Serenade Orchestra UK: Glenn Miller & Big Band Spectacular @ Middlesbrough Theatre. 7:30pm.

Thu 26: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 26: Gateshead Jazz Appreciation Society @ Brunswick Methodist Church, Newcastle NE1 7BJ. 2:00pm. £4.00. ‘Contemporary Jazz & the Piano’.
Thu 26: The New 58 Jazz Collective @ Hops & Cheese, Hartlepool. 7:30pm. Free.
Thu 26: Jo Harrop & Friends @ Hexham Abbey. 8:00pm. ‘An Evening with Jo Harrop & Friends’. A Hexham Abbey Festival of Music & Arts event. £20.00., £5.00. child/student.
Thu 26: Neil Yates & Tom Remon @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 26: Loco House Band @ Bar Loco, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 26: Tees Hot Club @ Dorma’s Club, Middlesborough. 8:30pm. Free. Mark Toomey, Neil Brodie, Graham Thompson, Adrian Beadnell.

Wednesday, November 07, 2018

Soft Machine @ Sage Gateshead - Nov. 6

John Etheridge (guitar); Theo Travis (tenor/soprano/flutes/keys & things); Roy Babbington (bass guitar); John Marshall (drums).
(Review by Lance/photos courtesy of Russell).
This wasn't Sage Gateshead. When we sashayed through those swing doors we were transported, Doctor Who-like, into a bygone era (albeit not price-wise). In Sage One they were back in the Golden Sixties. Were they golden? I don't remember.

For those that did remember they had P.J. Proby, The Fortunes, The Searchers and several other of those 'whatever became of' acts who's sounds first hit the airwaves from somewhere offshore. Those pirates of the high seas who broadcast from outside of the three-mile limit didn't have a Blackbeard although they did have a Blackburn (Tony) helping to plunder the pockets of the record buying public.


However, Team Bebop was above all of this, we were in the relative intimacy of Stage Two. We'd moved up a decade for the jazz-rock supergroup - Soft Machine.
Despite having Soft in the name, it wasn't. After the first few opening bars I was prepared to up and off but, it gradually took form, and I too had stepped back in time remembering hearing bands like Mike Westbrook, Graham Collier, Nucleus, Colosseum, etc.  all of whom must surely have laid their imprint on this band - or was it vice versa?

Etheridge, I'd heard many times. With Grappelli at Sunderland Empire; a lunchtime solo gig at a café in the Royal Albert Hall; gigs at the Corner House and yet, I never did get to hear him with Soft Machine or, if I did, I must have forgotten.

So tonight was, in a sense, catch-up time and it wasn't long before, after my initial shock, I was in the fan club (metaphorically speaking). Etheridge remains a master of his craft. Genres mean nothing, he just lays it down. Clapton, Hendrix, McLaughlin, Metheny, you name it. A wag in the audience, after one of the most blistering guitar solos ever, shouted "That was on a par with McLaughlin", before qualifying it with. "I didn't say better I said on a par with!"
Perhaps Steve T had given him a menacing glance.

Babbington and Marshall I'd heard before, possibly with John Surman in the 1980s but Travis was a new experience and a very pleasant one too on soprano, tenor and flute. I was less enamoured of his electronic tinkering although, in truth, it didn't hurt that much.

As a band, the sound comes across as tight, conveying the impression of being a bigger group. Tender moments were at a minimum and when they were they quickly grew into something bolder, even menacing and explosive. Music of the spheres that wasn't spherical often turning into, to quote Etheridge's own description, 'a good old rave-up' which it truly was.
A great night with a great band that didn't need to split their trousers*
Lance.
*Reference to P.J. Proby's claim to fame!

3 comments :

Phil D said...

Not the original band of course, but featuring 2nd generation players from the mid 70s, playing original and some Mike Ratledge tunes including 'Out-Bloody-Rageous'.

Wasn't sure what to expect, but thought that they balanced the explosive stuff pretty well with flute led tunes.

Just great to hear some fusion jazz rock again - very enjoyable.




Steve T said...

Since Etheridge also leads the Zappatistas, it't worth noting that it's oft said the whole Canterbury Progressive Rock scene (of whom the Softs were one of two leading bands) came from, not just Zappa, but specifically the Uncle Meat album, though I don't know how this applies to Caravan (the other).

Steve T said...

Looking through the Rocking the Classics book, I came across something I either didn't know or had forgotten. The guitarist immediately before and after Etheridge's seventies stint was Allan Holdsworth, one of a tiny number of guitarists ( Django, Hendrix, Paco Delucia, Al DiMeola) some actually do think as good or better than McLaughlin

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