CONCERT: APIA Good Times Tour with Russell Morris, Joe Camilleri, Richard Clapton, and Leo Sayer

A couple of weeks ago I headed to the beautiful Civic Theatre with C and E to see the APIA Good Times Tour.

 

This was an amazing concert with Russell Morris, Joe Camilleri, Richard Clapton, and Leo Sayer.

 

I've been a fan of all of them for some time, but never seen Clapton and Sayer, so was thrilled to attend. Each played about 5-6 songs in separate sets before joining forces for a rocking encore.

 

Morris was first off. I have loved Morris since I can remember, and saw him close to 20 years ago at a local club. He was brilliant, he had been through the ringer and was trying to make a comeback of sorts. Since then he has gone from strength to strength and this superb short set was testament to that. He began with 3 songs off his new blues album, Sharkmouth, which I love. Then he moved into Wings of an Eagle, a stunning, soaring song which showcases the most stunning voice. Next up was The Real Thing, a song so meticulously produced you wonder how it could be replicated on stage and yet if you closed your eyes (as I did) you could be hearing it for the first time on radio way back then. He ended with my personal favourite, Sweet Sweet Love. There are no words for how much I adore this stunning ballad/rock tune and his delivery was perfection. I was in heaven, and he looked like he was too.

Next up was the ever sunny Joe Camilleri. He played a couple of Black Sorrows songs and a few from his new album. Just as I was thinking to myself, this is good, but the songs from the Black Sorrows really need the Bull Sisters, out comes Vika Bull to sing, Never Let Me Go and she blew the roof off. What a magnificent voice she has, and her heart placed firmly outside her body, somewhere between the flower in her hair and the smile on her face - both gigantic! This upped the ante for Joe and what a performance from them both, ending with Chained to the Wheel.

After an intermission, Richard Clapton came out for his set. I somehow keep missing Clapton, how I have no idea as he tours prolifically. He was exactly as I imagined, shortish, jeans, black jeans, those black sunnies, and that wild hair, a no shit attitude and his voice sounding as if he had just cut the record yesterday...timeless is Richard! His set was hit after hit including Deep Water, Girls on the Avenue, Capricorn Dancer and Lucky Country. He was effortlessly cool, with a teeny wink of irony and sounded great.

Seemingly the wild card entry, Leo Sayer was next. I have to say I was most excited about Leo, a huge fan from way back, I could not wait to see if that cute/daggy pop I listened to as a kid could be replicated. And mostly it was, I felt his higher notes were a little shakey at times, but men's voices get richer with age, so that is forgiven. My main issue with Leo was the schtick, there was too much piss farting around between songs, cut that out and we could have had another song. Having said that I had the hugest smile on my face when he was singing. Some of the hits churned out in his set where More Than I Can Say, When I Need You, Dreamin' (he wrote this with Cliff Richard), Thunder in my Heart, and my personal favourite Long Tall Glasses. God I love that song!

Then he was joined on stage by Camilleri, Morris, and Clapton for You Make Me Feel Like Dancing, seeing Clapton singing back up for this was one of the great joys of my life. Then Morris took the lead vocals for Hush, Camilleri for Shape I'm In, and Clapton for I Am An Island (another favourite). Vika Bull joined their superb backing band as backing vocalist for this encore which ended with a crazy rendition of Good Times. And good times it was, the show had gone on for close to 3 hours and we didn't want it to end.