On 23rd May we paid tribute to local hero Ray Davies. Nat kicked things off with “Dead End Street” and an old song by his band The Reverse, “Other Boys”. Alien Jazz Party demonstrated that the spirit of punk rock wasn’t dead with a ragged and enthused set, inviting a member of the audience on stage to sing lead on “Sunny Afternoon”. Rob McCabe from Tall Stories made his UTI debut with a great rendition of “Do You Remember Walter”, whilst Anna Page got the audience singing along to “Victoria”.
Mark Nevin, the driving force behind Fairground Attraction was joined onstage by Sarah Blackwood (Dubstar) for a stunning version of Waterloo Sunset and played his own tribute to the Kinks frontman “I Know Where Ray Davies Lives”, which had the audience in hysterics.
Sgt Buzfuz was also joined onstage by a guest backing singer, Polly from Slate Islands, for a gorgeous rendition of his new single “Danny’s Room”.
The Lucky Face introduced the crowd to the more obscure Davies tune “When I Turn Off The Living Room Light” as well as his own brilliant “Loretta” and My Mate George got the crowd really going for his take on “Plastic Man”.
To finish off the acts all took to the stage for a shambolic but enthusiastic rendition of “Lola”.
Speaking with one of the more enthused members of the crowd at the end, she admitted that she was a friend of Ray’s and had been texting him during the night trying to encourage him to come down. He was apparently in another pub in Highgate and felt a bit too embarrassed to come down as everyone would know him. A shame but completely understandable, would you go to your own tribute night?
Videos coming soon…
(we were one of the picks of the week in Saturday’s Guardian Guide!)
Nice work.Was hoping to get up for this.Ah, shame Ray Davies a tad worried at turning up to gig.Night a little longer, few more drinks in that Highgate pub, bit of dutch courage.Who knows.Cheers for the review, good night had it seems.Best H.
This was great actually, I particularly enjoyed the young man at the start who done a fantastic version of 20th Century Man, it must’ve taken some courage for him to sing that, plus I recall Got To Be Free somewhere in his set between his own material which tied in quite nicely to the set.