Reviews

Colin Blunstone Band The Jam House

This promised to be a great night, and in the event, turned out to be even better than we could have hoped!

From the start of a fine set from opener Callum Beattie – a local lad from Musselburgh – to the encores from Blunstone and his band, it was an absolute pleasure to be there.

A special mention for Callum; he has the potential to go a long way in this business, he has already garnered praise from some big names and he won over the audience tonight with a great set finishing with “Salamander Street”, which he co-wrote with a young guy who works behind the bar in ‘Skippers’ in Musselburgh.

Then after a short interval Colin Blunstone walked onto the stage with his band and proceeded to treat us to all the classics from The Zombies plus his solo songs including “Wonderful” (much to the delight of our Chairman Kenny Stitt). We also had “Say You Don’t Mind”, “Time of the Season” and “I Don’t Believe In Miracles” along with a host of other great tracks. Sadly though, no “On the Air Tonight” the title track of his latest album and an original song by a great friend of mine from The Jury days, Willy Finlayson.

Colin’s band are, as you might expect, very accomplished musicians and were note perfect tonight. Spurred on by great drums and an awesome lead guitarist (I found out after the gig this lad also plays in the current line-up of The Zombies) they, along with the bass player (the youngest of the group) and a keyboard player with a great sound – he even managed to recreate the sound of a Hammond organ (obviously sampled as it came from a little keyboard unit) were just great.

The audience was right behind Colin from start to finish. Let’s keep in mind Colin is about to celebrate his 69th Birthday. His voice even at his age is absolutely amazing and for him to hit high notes the way he did simply blew Pedro Gillan, Kenny Stitt and me away.

The Jam House is a great venue, if a tad expensive for a beer, but it was worth it for the quality that Colin Blunstone and his Band provided tonight.

Ian Robertson