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Fifteen thousand tongues hanging out, drooling. Not a pleasant sight. Openers Squeeze - playful, frisky, but as lost in this big barn of a place as a blind puppy going for your ankles - were pretty much tolerated as the wait went on. It's been over two years and 40 songs since EC played here - going in one year from the Whisky to the Civic to a cut-down "Intimate Arena setting". I quote - with a show that was dull, detached, bare and blase and about as intimate as a dead vibrator. A small bespectacled Bendy-toy going through the motions before an All-American cheerleader crowd dressed up to the nines. Then it seemed that American rock had got to Elvis before Elvis had got to American rock - as lifeless as the rest of them.
But somewhere in between (absence makes the heart, time heals all wounds etc etc etc) Elvis has GOT HAPPY and it makes for one hellofa show. The packed crowd was bananas in advance. Anything would have been okay, but we got the lot. Showman, Crooner, Redcoat, Rock and Roller - hallelujah, light the bangers and fire the soundman, another night of rock and roll heaven in a basketball barn.
It starts - surprise, surprise - with a slow one, a solo. A paunchy El, crammed into the suit a farmer wears when he goes to see his bank manager, bulging waistcoat and all, croons a new one. 'Shot With His Own Gun,' accompanied by just a sad piano, moody spotlight and Al Jolson hand-gestures and tasteless whoops and whistles from the rabid throng at all the wrong moments. A powerful beginning.
Then on run Bruce and Pete for 'Accidents Will Happen' and the pace gets more hysterical as more and more songs in the Official '80s Dance-beat follow on recklessly, provoctively; Farmer Elvis flinging himself into ringing, wiry, passionate guitar breaks over the Attractions' hard, brilliant backing, still managing to shine through the murky sound (my old Dansette used to be better, I swear).
Though there's enough oldies to generate enough apeshit reaction to fertilise the entire California basin, about a third of the set is new stuff, presumably from the next album.
Remaining text and scanner-error corrections to come...
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