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Copyright
Nick Morgan and crew
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JOE
COCKER
Foire aux Vins, Colmar, France, August 11th, 2007
It’s
a wine region here, so we have a huge wine
fair in the city of Colmar every year in August,
with all the fitting overindulgences that you
may guess. |
| The
most surprising part of that fair, that is, are
all the concerts that take place every evening since
fifty years or so, often showcasing world famous
bands and singers, some of them not hesitating to
take a stroll along the wine booths after their
shows (I’ll always remember that evening when,
while sipping a gewuztraminer at one of the booths,
I suddenly noticed that the tall guy with long hair
and a strange accent standing next to me was Robert
Plant). Of course we had many French-speaking singers,
such as Brel, Trénet, Brassens or Aznavour,
but also all kinds of international artistes such
as Ray Charles, Pink Floyd, James Brown, Chet Baker,
Lou Reed, Dizzy Gillespie, ZZ Top, Iggy Pop or Joan
Baez to name but a few. Yes, it’s quite eclectic!
This year the programme is rather varied again,
with interesting gigs to choose from, including
quite a few old lags: The Chemical Brothers, Norah
Jones, Ten Years After, Mika, Status Quo, Smashing
Pumpkins… And that good old Joe
Cocker, whom we never saw live before,
even if he already performed at the Foire aux Vins
seven years ago. |
| So,
here we are for Joe Cocker, in the so-called ‘coquille’,
a semi-open air concert hall that can shelter up
to 9,000 people. And it’s full with a pretty
eclectic audience tonight, spanning several generations.
There’s the “With a little help”
generation, or should I say “Woodstock”.
White hair if any, Lacoste polo shirt (crushed raspberries
seems to be quite hot a colour this year, just like
last year, and the year before, and the year before…)
and heavy cotton trousers, beige of course. |
 |
| Then
the “Unchain my heart” generation. Men,
no style, women, discotheque style, stamped 1988.
And finally the “You can leave your hat on”
generation, that is to say just anybody, since ‘that’
movie is regularly rerun on television.On stage
it’s a large band. Drums, percs, bass (a charming
girl – but why do so many bands hire female
bassists these days? Is the thin girl - big guitar
combo that hot?), guitar (Gene Black, excellent,
he does both solo and rhythm and brings a more rock
and roll side to the whole), tenor sax and accordion
(good player), Hammond organ, Fender Rhodes (I believe)
and two omnipresent female vocalists. And, of course,
Mr Joe Cocker, all dressed in black and starting
to look more and more like a thicker Anthony Hopkins. |
 |
They
are all as regular as clockwork from the first song
on (I think it’s Chain of Fools) till the
very end of the set and the whole really sounds
like a studio album. Perfect tuning, perfect voice,
but everything is very predictable and some passages
are too polished for my tastes, like that schmaltzy
“Up where we belong” (from the movie
Officer and Gentleman, aaargh!) or a very reggae-ish
“Summer in the city”. Now, Joe Cocker
is in very good voice I must say, doing his famous
and obligatory shrieks exactly like… err,
at Woodstock. Granted, the skilful backing vocalists
really support the whole almost permanently but
Mr Cocker, 63, hasn’t lost a single bit of
it despite all the compulsory excesses he did in
the 1970’s, of which all biographies of any
rock legends are full anyway (whether dead or alive).
|
| And
of course he does his trademark epileptic body movements,
forearms and hands, playing with imaginary pianos
and guitars as if it was what he had preferred to
do in the first place – even if I’ve
read that he used to be a drummer when he was a
kid. |
| The
gig is sometimes really like a variety show, despite
the very heavy drumming (no swing so it does not
mean a thing) and Gene Black’s rare guitar
solos, all very perfect (did I already write that?).
Little blues, little soul and sometimes it all sounds
like a casino orchestra at 2am, especially when
the dreadful electric piano is in action. It gets
better with “N’oubliez jamais”,
the audience cheering of course since there’s
a few French words in that song. Then there’s
that “You are so beautiful” and all
women in the audience are overcome with love and
sing the refrain, which sounds quite horrible I
must say. And then it’s “I put a spell
on you”, a bit dull I’m afraid, except
for the guitar solo (geez!) and the support of the
Hammond organ. The crowd likes it, that is, and
Joe Cocker says, “Thank you Colmar, we’ve
been on the road for so long, 40 years!” |
Then
the backing vocalists start to sway their hips…
Yes, it’s “You can leave your hat on”,
of course. Works like musical aphrodisiac it seems,
as the young couples in front of us get closer to
each other after Madame had made languorous eyes
at Monsieur. Actually, all women in the hall seem
to think they are Kim Basinger at this point, although
the male part of the audience doesn’t seem
to agree too much.
Then comes “The Letter”. FM sound stamped
1995 this time, a bit embarrassing but certainly
less than the almost pure disco sound of “Unchain
my heart” that follows. I never liked that
song. They play it ponderously, which makes it longer
and more painful to my ears, but the crowd stands
up as one man. They like it! There is a perfect
moment that is, which is the sax solo. Solos! Actually,
he sounds as if he is improvising, but he probably
isn’t. Improvising? C’mon! |
 |
| And
finally, the grand moment a part of the crowd has
been waiting for since the beginning of the show,
“With a little help from my friends”.
I must say he does this last song of the gig perfectly,
the famous two screeches being perfectly executed,
and even if it’s a shortened version it seems
(not Woodstock’s 8 minutes), and doubling
the tempo at the end works perfectly. Yes, all perfect
now, and Joe Cocker’s voice is superb I must
say, maybe it’s the Corona that’s waiting
for him backstage. |
 |
By
the way, we found on the Web a very interesting
list (well) of Mr Cocker’s requirements to
all concert organisers. It reads; ‘Joe
Cocker’s dressing room: to be prepared by
6 pm. Food: 1 bowl of fresh, assorted, uncut fruit
(to include banana). Drinks: ice chest with lots
of ice, containing only the beer. 4 litres of Evian
water. 4 bottles of Gatorade (lemon lime), 8 cans
of diet Coke, 8 bottles of Corona beer. Beer to
be iced at 6pm, re-iced at 8pm and again at 10:45pm
(“Little Help”). Clean cubed (not crushed)
ice for drinks – 8pm & 10:45, only beer
to be iced. After show: (approx. 10 minutes after
the end of the show), one serving of traditional
Shepherds pie, with a side of baked beans will be
required each show night after the performance.
To be advised by the Tour Manager if needed. Fresh
clean ice for drinks after show.’ Well,
all that plus what’s to be prepared on stage
(20 cans of beer for the whole band, diet Sprite,
Evian, Gatorade and so on.) They are heavy on drinks
it seems! |
| But
it’s time for the first encore, a song that
I didn’t know - quite good - and then “Cry
me a river”, where the drummer sounds like
if he was with the Spinal Tap. The crowd cheers,
so there’s going to be a second encore, John
Fogerty’s beautiful “Long as I can see
the light”, from Joe Cocker’s latest
album “Hymn for my soul”. A small part
of the audience hisses (pearls before swine, *ssh*les!)
but it really is the best part of the show. I’d
love to go see Mr Cocker singing only this kind
of music, I’m sure he would be brilliant.
But like all great musicians he’s probably
a prisoner of his repertoire… |
| «We
love you, keep rocking, we’ll be back!»
are Joe Cocker’s last words before he leaves
the stage for good, and probably for more beer,
ending a true live encyclopaedia of soul rock hits.
Mrs Serge tells me that she didn’t know that
Joe Cocker had created so many hits, so I feel I
have to tell her that what we just heard was some
Creedence Clearwater Revival (-who?), and
that what we had heard before was some Beatles (-ah!),
some Julie London (-who?), some Box Tops
(-who?), some Screamin' Jay Hawkins (-who?),
some Aretha Franklin (-rings a bell!),
some Lovin’ Spoonful (-who?) or some
Buffy Sainte-Marie (-who?). Yes, Mrs Serge
isn't into rock and roll. As for Joe Cocker, sure
he delivered (“a touching and sincere travel
though time” wrote the local press), but again,
we’d have preferred something less polished.
Maybe less professional and less for all public,
in fact, just like what he was probably doing in
that Sheffield pub where he used to play in the
early sixties. But that’s being a bit too
demanding I guess. Sorry. - Serge |
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