2024 marks the 45th anniversary of Marc Almond’s career in music that’s included chart topping pop, torch songs, French chansons, Russian folk and much more. His latest album ‘I’m Not Anyone’, contains covers of some of his favourite songs and this sets the scene for tonight’s performance.
Against a huge, red curtain backdrop, the five piece band assembled with three backing singers on our left. Marc appeared in a spangly jacket, ignored the centre-stage stool and grabbed the mic for a Hammond organ and sitar-heavy ‘I’m The Light’, the Blue Cheer song that also opens the new album. Against the psychedelic swirl, with arms outstretched, he gave a fine falsetto finish.
The jacket is soon discarded to reveal a crushed velvet black shirt, in time for another Almond take on a Northern Soul classic – Rita & The Tiaras’ ‘Gone With The Wind (Is My Love)’. This is a four-to-the-floor stomper with Marc’s arms acting out the words over a stabbing piano. He may have forgotten his inhaler but his voice sounded in fine form. It’s only when he takes a seat and chats that his voice reveals a slight raspiness.
He reminisces about watching the Val Doonican TV show, and it’s the Irish crooner’s version that introduced him to Bob Lind’s hardy perennial 60s classic, ‘Elusive Butterfly’. The jaunty arrangement stayed faithful to the breezy original and the vocalists sounded heavenly. Backing singer Bryan Chambers got to shine on a duet of Mahalia Jackson’s‘ Trouble Of The World’, before the first Jacques Brel number of the show was prefaced with a knowing look as Marc remembered Cher’s Phil Spector-produced version of ‘A Woman’s Story’.
Marc’s tongue-in-cheek preamble of “bi now, gay later” gets a big laugh before he raced through a frenetic, almost fairground like, rendition of Earth Kitt’s ‘The Heel’, that showcased the whole band, especially Hugh Wilkinson’s vibes. He spoke fondly of seeing the 94-year-old Charles Aznavour perform at The Albert Hall and over the next four songs he showed why this master songwriter-performer’s work is the perfect match for this singular performer.
From the jazz club style of ‘The Boss Is Dead’, with guitarist Neal X on knee slaps, alongisde brushed drums and vibes, to the stripped back duet with double bass on ‘Yesterday When I Was Young’, Almond wrung every last syllable out of each line, alone in the spotlight.
Aznavour’s bold comment on the gay experience in 1972, ‘What Makes A Man’ was a very exposed performance and the section ended with the bouncy ‘I Have Lived’. These beautifully-crafted pieces showed that Almond, like Frank Sinatra, really gets inside a song to become its protagonist.
I can’t think of any other singer that would go from Aznavour to Syd Barrett (as Almond said himself) but ‘Terrapin’ from The Madcap Laughs fits in perfectly with a slow finger-snapping groove and clear enunciation. Incredibly, ‘Gloomy Sunday’, Billie Holiday’s “cheerful little number” is marred by a rapidly-escalating fight in the front stalls that lasted into ‘Dream Lover’. However, as security and other audience members tried to quell the trouble, the crowd began to clap and sing along to distract from the chaos and help keep Marc and Neal X on track.
With order restored, the band become a rock ‘n’ roll trio for Elvis’s ‘One Night Of Sin’, after which Marc led the crowd in a chorus of ‘Happy Birthday’ for his long-time collaborator, Neal X. ‘How Can I Be Sure’ was a hit for David Cassidy and the arrangement with its changing time signatures and questioning lyrics, comes off like a grandiose show tune, lifted by the vocal talents of Ruth White, Florence Rawlings and Bryan Chambers.
Precious memories were shared of encounters with musical idols as a teenager. Arriving in Liverpool, after being beaten up, for a Bowie gig, to have his hand held by the great man while singing Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide must have had a huge impact on the starstuck teenager, only to be brought down to earth at a later Cockney Rebel show by asking for an autograph and being told to “piss off” by Steve Harley. Tonight’s version of ‘London Boys’ put some meat on the bones of the original, written while Bowie was still channelling Anthony Newley.
Jacques Brel’s ‘If You Go Away’ segued comfortably into Scott Walker’s ‘Big Louise’, two more songwriters that Almond has immersed himself in. ‘The House Is Haunted’ dates from 1934 but it’s the Mel Torme version that Marc gave a swaggering take on, bathed in a ghostly blue spotlight.
‘The Days of Pearly Spencer’ has long been in his repertoire and a perfect fit for the final section with uptempo strings and cowboy rhythms. The “tenements and dirty streets” lyrics are perfect subject matter but Marc’s bad knee meant an interpretive hand dance had to suffice in place of him bouncing around the stage.
It was ‘hands in the air’ singalong sway time, as he delivered a commanding vocal on ‘Something’s Gotten Hold of My Heart’ and, free of synth limitations, ‘Tainted Love’ was a hybrid of Gloria Jones’ original and Soft Cell’s own, iconic cover. A heavily-percussive ‘Jacky’, with the singers becoming a celestial choir, could easily have been the perfect big finish but it was the high drama of Dusty’s ‘I Close My Eyes and Count to Ten’ that closed the show to a well-deserved standing ovation.
For the encore to the two-hour show, Marc thanked the audience for “sticking with me for the past 45 years. This show feels like 45 years!”, and the night ended with the title track of the album, a downbeat showstopper, ‘I’m Not Anyone’ that felt like a lesser known ‘My Way’.
Marc Almond has made a career from cherry picking the songs of others and making them his own and tonight’s triumphant show was a connoisseur’s collection of 3 minute mini-epics, delivered by a master of his art.
Tonight’s opening act, Alex Lipinski, was restricted to just twenty short minutes due to the headliner’s huge setlist, but the people who had arrived early were generous in their applause for the four songs the Weston-Super-Mare troubadour managed to squeeze in. His set was a blend of Country-tinged ballads and a more contemporary sound on ‘Coyote’, all of which displayed his excellent microphone technique. He finished, fittingly, with a cover of Nick Cave’s ‘Into My Arms’ but would return later to join Marc and the band for a few numbers.
Marc Almond, Brighton Dome Concert Hall
Wednesday 11th September 2024
Photos by Rob Trendy
