Terry Reid Live Review @ Ronnie Scotts (London) - 22 Jun 2009

Photo: David Sinclair

Live Review

I looked at my watch and I was 17 and my head exploded when I heard that first LP. It was 1969 and I had found him and he would stay with me, baby, for the rest of my life...now it is summer 2009 and my hero Terry Reid returned to his beloved Blighty from his home in California (via a Paris recording session with French hopefuls Shine) for a three-night Soho residency at the famous Ronnie Scott's jazz club, celebrating its 50th anniversary. Never leaving line-ups settled for too long, this version of the Terry Reid Band has the gently inscrutable Max Middleton on keyboards; intense, smiley drummer Ash Soan; unflappable, stoic bassist Mark Smith and the new Fender Telecaster kid-in-town, wearing his bandana over his Phil May-length hair, Ed Rainey (from New Jersey's Cosmic American Derelicts).

The band take their places on a stage that is laden with multi-thousand dollar array of Gibson electric and acoustic guitars, they kick in and set the scene with the funkiest, hippest groove of The Frame (from the epochal 1976 Seed of Memory album) and at the absolutest, rightest moment and not a nano-second before or later, our man emerges, inevitably dressed to thrill, looking good with his crazy-uncle coiffure and that devilish glint in his eye. The warmth in this room has nothing to do with the London heat-wave outside, there's "welcome-home" cheers from full houses over three nights as Terry says "hello" and takes The Frame for a laid-back meander away from the recorded version, stretching the tune and free-forming lyrics over the band, an unbeatable start to a memorable evening.

The first song he wrote, as a young man a long time ago, hushes the audience into reverence of the unique after-the-beat motif and surreal exotic lyrics "Have you ever ridden horses through a rainstorm", delivered in the rough-meets-smooth tones that are his, and his only. The seeming lifetimes that some have waited for these evenings are already validated by Without Expression alone, in this all-a-tingle room, with Jimmy Page in unobtrusive mid-week attendance. Eddie's sympathetic guitar picks out the familiar country chords to Faith to Arise and it takes righteous, uplifting wings, Reid in full flight, successfully defending his Godfather of British Rap title, going off at tangents, re-writing lyrics on the hoof - Faith To Arise prompts a tale of an incredibly happenstance recent meeting on an LA freeway with a teenage pal from long-times ago, way back in mid-60s Cambridge.

I'd never heard John David Souther's 'Ain't Much Between (Leaving And Gone)' before I heard it for the first time a handful of years back but half-a-bar in, I had known it forever. It's a killer of a late night lament that JD realised was "made" for Reid, whose inimitable vocal is a thing of wonder and at this point, I have to watch what I'm doing, I'm having so much fun that I'm finishing his songs for him - this is, maybe, my favourite just now - and, wow, he really nails it, stone dead, tonight - and no-one in this room will ever forget it.

The sadness underlying much of Reid's work manifests itself poignantly in Don't Know Why (I'm Shy About You), another irresistible, recently-conceived tear-jerking minor-key contemplation, owing much to a golden era of songwriting, with that line "here I am, alone and in love" that just slays me, every time. His samba rhythm interpretation of 'Don't Worry Baby', hits a spot so sweet that Brian Wilson must be delighted at Terry's care and custodianship, conveyed in his serrated-sweet, in your ear, confidential whisper, to touching, stunning effect. Terry scrapes off the surface and paints over his masterpiece, restructuring River as a leisurely-paced bossa nova, with its subtle rhythmic glance over the shoulder at Terry's 70s London flat-mate Gilberto Gil - a minimalist tour de force, Terry on guitar and vocals and Ash on bongos - a new-age, stretching, languid bossa nova for then, when Gil was in political exile and for now, when he is Brazil's Minister of Culture - a dreamy, hazy, tropicalista delight that brings the house down.

Beautiful Girl is another intriguing story, a squishy heart-melter dedicated to Annette, his wife - when he wants to be, Terry Reid is the best crooner either side of the Atlantic - and he truly wants it, these wonderful days. He moves an audience, hushes a room, turns a crowd into friends, like nobody else can. The one-of-its-kind Brave Awakening, an elegy to the death of County Durham coal mines, is just one of the many show stoppers during the residency, a poignant blues in all but structure.

The panoramic, enchanting Hong Kong prompts a tantalising Terry tale of the number's birth - an overheard snatch of a traditional Chinese folk song, hummed by the concierge in a Hong Kong mens' room. Special guest (Rolling Stones and Terry collaborator) Mick Taylor's sublime chiming Gibson Les Paul guitar and Middleton's expertly judged keyboard playing are immense. Terry's Dylanesque autobiographical The Road We Chose is a rolling guitar thunderstorm and on the Wednesday night - wait for it, as unlikely as it may sound - Aretha's Natural Woman is transformed into a Reid-Taylor vocal duet and Taylor guitar solo sensation so I'm thinking that maybe life don't really get much better than this...but it does, as finally Reid caroused into a joyous Waterloo Sunset with everyone, band, audience staff, tourists outside on Frith Street singing along. It's quite a thought that, despite Terry changing the set about on each of these three perfect nights (not all mentioned here), there's no sign of the song that gave this remarkable and enduring national treasure his name, Superlungs. That alone is testament to his songbook and the left-field set of covers featured. One day soon, I know that Terry Reid will record his current songbook and every one of those songs will be acclaimed and cherished. He closed the show, inevitably, with the mystic, impeccable Seed of Memory that morphs into a requiem for Brit troops in hostile locations - bring the boys home.

Everyone who saw him in 2009 will tell their loved ones, with warmth and pride "I was there to see Terry Reid and he spoke to my soul." It was wonderful to see you again with your daft duck-walk, with your irresistible cackle, with that voice, but most of all, in your eye, we saw that 'Silver White Light'...I looked at my watch a lifetime later and we had been to the dark side of the moon, through the mangle, but my oh my Tel, we all sure as hell came out of it - thanks mate.

Peter Innes

Gigs

Fri 3rd Sep 2010
- Terry Reid
- The Boardwalk (Sheffield)
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Sat 4th Sep 2010 and Sun 5th Sep 2010
- Terry Reid
- The Inn At Lathones (Fife)
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Thu 9th Sep 2010
- Terry Reid
- The Cellars - Eastney (Portsmouth)
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