Dave Woodhall watches the Beat brave the elements and an inappropriate venue.
“Thanks for coming out on a rainy Monday night in Birmingham.” Dave Wakeling’s opening words at the Town Hall were nothing if not accurate; the blistering weather of the current heatwave had given way to a sudden downpour that lowered the temperature outside, if not the levels of anticipation, as the returning hero brought the latest incarnation of the Beat to where it all started.
You know what you’re going to get – a run-through of the anthems that helped define a generation. The Beat were the most political of the bands that started out on Two-Tone – you’d never catch them singing jolly ditties about our house in the middle of our street – and the most punk-edged.
Dave’s current band work through a set of unabashed nostalgia, and the references that Dave regularly made to growing up in Birmingham were probably as confusing to them as they were recognisable to the audience.
A broken string during a scintillating cover of the Staple Singers I’ll Take You there gave Dave the opportunity to show his punk roots, while Can’t Get Used To Losing You gave a moment of poignancy as the Balsall Heath legend reminded us of Saxa, Roger and Everett Morton, “I still can’t get use to losing them.” Indeed, we can’t.
And there was one of the problems of the evening. Toasting frontman Antonee First Class is a good singer and an even better dancer but, on a night like this, the comparisons with Ranking Roger were inevitable and you can’t replace the best.
Whine & Grind/Stand Down Margaret led to a comment about how good it was that thee days we don’t have to worry about rising prices, social division and the threat of nuclear holocaust. Indeed. Too Nice To Talk To, with a haunting sax solo from the immaculate Matt Morrish, was written “after a forlorn night at Barbarella’s”. I can’t relate to that because I was too young, honest.
Mirror in the Bathroom was the inevitable set-closer with the equally-inevitable audience participation, which leads me to the second problem of the night. The Town Hall is a great venue, for the right artists; Dave spoke about the memorable nights he had there in his youth, including David Bowie’s legendary Ziggy Stardust tour. But for a band like the Beat, where dancing is as much a part of the event as listening, it just doesn’t work. The songs were great, the band do their best and Dave is as engaging as ever – as he said before the encore, “My dad and my grandad fought the Nazis, then we did our bit on the streets. Now they’re back – what is it, best of four?”.
The parts, though, don’t add up to what the whole should be. Perhaps next time, a venue made more for dancing rather than foot-tapping. And less references to musicians from LA – this is Birmingham and the only Hollywood round here is the one you can get to on the number fifty.
Before the Beat there was more post-punk nostalgia as Annabella Lewin led her new version of Bow Wow Wow through a drum-heavy set of songs, many of which the curious though enthusiastic audience knew or remembered after the first couple of lines. And she can certainly still move.
