LIVE

Rip It Up, Issue 18, 1 December 1978, Page 18

LIVE

Bruce Belsham

Flight 7-7 The Gluepot It appears to me that Flight 7-7 have got themselves into a bit of a jam. On the one hand they are trying to establish themselves as an exciting and original band. On the other they are

reaching for the New Wave Top 40 slot Misex left behind.

Flight 7-7 are Jeff Adrenalin on vocals, Smarty on drums, Warrick Keay on bass, Bruce Leighton on guitar and Simon Page on keyboards. Their set features competent covers of hits by Tom Robinson, Elvis Costello, The Stranglers, Graham Parker and Tom Petty. All well received by the crowd and deservedly so. But the trouble with being a juke box is that

you can sound a bit lifeless. While the band looked like they were giving it 100% there was a distinct lack of punch in the performance. Sheerlux at the Windsor next day packed twice the lop/gjMHBHPBMaaaBMH Still, as I say they were good to watch. Having a separate lighting and sound man;(lan Twaddle) shows true professional standards that pay off. Again on the positive side the original material displays promising melodies and clever ar[rangements.ifijfflWMttßflßßHjßpßKß^jji So they may be in something of a fix. The answer is not too difficult though. Play more stuff you really enjoy, then kick out the jams. Dominic Free

Johnny and the Hookers Island of Real The Island of Real has its pretensions. The good French bread and Gouda, home-made gateau, an open fire even in mid November: the legacy of its early hopes as an intimate music club.

Somehow Johnny and the Hookers are misplaced amidst this cosiness and its polite audience. Perhaps that accounts for the strangely mixed reaction the Hookers solicited with their brief November season at the cafe.

Principally Johnny and the Hookers are a pithy rock and roll act. They play three minute

songs, discard musical ornament and emit an aggressive pumping rhythm descended from British rhythm and blues. They are at their best, New Zealand’s Doctor Feelgood, a comparison aided by energetic covers of songs like the Feelgood’s "Sneaking Suspicion". The fact that they are more suited to a barroom than a coffee-house should not be taken as a judgement. The Hookers at the Island of Real wrestled with not only an unsuitable atmosphere but a badly muffled P.A. Despite that the small crowd was successfully pulled to its feet and most were full of compliments. There were a few I heard complain of the sound but the issue was more incomprehension than incompetence.

Having lost their original drummer, the rhythm section is probably a little splashier than before. However the Hookers (Paul Andrews vocals, Dave Mclean lead guitar, Johnny Batchelor rhythm guitar, Mark Page Bass, Jeff Warr drums) convey an innate feel for that kind of chunky R&B appropriate to early Stone's songs. The band’s attention to such mid sixties classics means good fun, and surprisingly the steam engine treatment works as well for the Supremes’ “Where did our Love Go” and The Loving Spoonful’s “Summer in the City” as for the Stones' “All Over Now". After all Graham Parker did catch Johnny and the Hookers at the Windsor Castle and expressed his approval. I can see no reason to argue with him.