COLLECTING-CANS dogged one's route to last night's show, seeking
donations for three separate worthy causes. Anti-racism. Childline.
Rumania.
I gave; I gave; I gave up and did a body-swerve. Are Chris Rea fans
reckoned to be a more charitable bunch? Probably.
After all, increasing numbers of them have been happily accepting
Chris's minimalist blues twang-thang during his slow rise to low-key
superstardom over the past seven years.
What does he give them? What do they want? Toe-tapping reassurance? A
musicianly skate over the surface? I give in.
And add up what they got last night that they wouldn't have got from
staying at home listening to the records.
Not a lot, a proper Rea-list. Nice coloured lights above their heads
and sometimes in their eyes. Occasional swirls of backlit dry ice which
served to silhouette Chris's not insubstantial form. A band, one member
of which wore a panama hat. Rain, thunder, sea, and seagull noises.
Momentary blasts of fireworks (not metaphysical, though, and never
lasting long enough to be illuminating). Chris sitting down for a bit,
playing chunky slide guitar. Chris standing up playing chunky blues
guitar. Chris waving, briefly. Chris clapping both his hands at chin
height, less briefly.
And Chris's voice? Huskily world-weary; the growl of a planed-down Tom
Waits. Neither angry nor joyous, merely resigned. Lacking the energy to
be wistful.
Philosophy? ''Keep your head down . . . don't you ever think no-one's
better than you.''
Whoah, mama. I got them Ploddy, Polite, Prosaic, Non-Transformatory
Blues again, sho' nuff. To paraphrase Chris's own Road To Hell, ''this
ain't no upwardly-mobile freeway . . . this is a flipping cul-de-sac.''
Grieve generously for the self-limiting future of rock'n'roll.
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