THE KORGIS – THE CON CLUB, LEWES 5.4.24
Tonight’s gig at the Con Club in Lewes has been organised by local promoters Love Thy Neighbour and is a little on the unusual side. The full title of the current tour is ‘The Korgis’ Time Machine’. The premise being that despite the band having a not inconsiderable back catalogue, their set will also include covers of songs that matter to them, for whatever reason.
Indeed, at one point bassist and Korgis founder member James Warren told us “I’ve always wanted to be in a covers band. I wanna play Butlins!!!” Well James, tonight you have achieved at least a small part of your ambition.
However, proceedings commence with ‘The Last Plimsole’ by Stackridge, the band James and fellow Korgis co-founder Andy Davis (no longer in The Korgis) were in before The Korgis formed. I must confess that this particular song is much rockier than I expected. It features a really quite impressive guitar solo from Al Steele, while Danielle Nicholls rocks out on xylophone, which is something that before tonight I didn’t know was possible.
This is followed by tonight’s first Korgis song: ‘If I Had You’, which was their first hit. Indeed, the screens behind the band (which are made to look like old TVs) show a clip of the band on ‘Top Of The Pops’ miming (I presume) to the track. I can’t help thinking that this is rather brave. I’d certainly think twice about showing photographs or film of myself from forty-five years ago in public. The current rendition of the song includes some nice slide guitar courtesy of Al Steele.
At this point in the evening we get our first cover, which is ‘The Only Living Boy In New York’ by Simon & Garfunkel. Apparently, when keyboardist and vocalist John Baker was at school in Bath (with Roland Orzabal from Tears For Fears no less) the song was a favourite of his. Fair enough. It’s a good version too.
The Tears For Fears link doesn’t end there either. The next song, ‘Ever Met A Day’ is by John’s first band Graduate, who were a mod revival band, and who I vaguely remember. What John fails to tell us is that Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith (also later of Tears For Fears) were in the band. Not only that, from 1977 John and Roland played the pubs and clubs of Bath as a duo called The Baker Brothers. Again, ‘Ever Met A Day’ is accompanied by a TV clip of Graduate playing the song.
Graduate were signed to a publishing deal by producer and songwriter Tony Hatch. In tribute to him the band play ‘Downtown’ by Petula Clark, as Tony Hatch composed the song. This may seem a slightly tenuous reason to perform the song, but it doesn’t really matter as Danielle Nicholls absolutely nails the vocals.
Next we get a Korgis original: ‘If It’s Alright With You Baby’, which was the follow-up to ‘Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime’. I don’t recall ever hearing ‘If It’s Alright With You Baby’. It only got to number 56, so that’s probably why.
James tells us a story about Peter Gabriel. When The Korgis were recording in Bath in 1979, they met Gabriel and borrowed some of his equipment. This encounter is deemed sufficient to warrant a cover of Peter Gabriel’s ‘Solsbury Hill’, which is very faithful to the original.
We leave the covers behind for a while for some new songs! Yep, there’s life in the old coves yet! The first of these is ‘Letter To Geelong’, which is about “ten pound Poms” communicating with their friends and families in the UK, who in that era prior to affordable air travel they were unlikely to see again. Considering the subject matter the song is surprisingly jaunty.
Another new song is ‘The Good Old Days Of The Cold War’, which parodies Putin. This really is political satire at its best, which unfortunately is something largely missing from modern music, with honourable exceptions such as Idles, Snayx and Sleaford Mods. Although I would point out that The Korgis’ music and satire is considerably more gentle than that of the aforementioned artists.
However, we soon return to the covers. Al Steele was once in Del Shannon’s backing band. Therefore we get a cover of the great man’s ‘Runaway’. However, what we don’t get is the keyboard solo, which is an integral part of the song. That’s not really cricket chaps.
In 1982 The Korgis were produced by Trevor Horne. Therefore we get a rather excellent cover of ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’. James refers to Trevor as “a genius”. I really can’t disagree. In 1990 The Korgis reunited to record a track for the International Hostage Release Foundation. This went so well that they decided to record an album, ‘This World’s For Everyone’, which was released in 1992. They play a song from the album: ‘Hold On’. I have to say that for a song released in the early 1990s, it sounds very much stuck in the 1980s.
The Korgis’ first set ends with the title track of ‘This World’s For Everyone’. This was inspired by Al Steele’s work for a charity in Liberia. The guitar part seems to be very much inspired by The Edge from U2. Paul Smith provides some very African sounding drum patterns, and Liberian children’s choir Matsiko are on the backing track. It’s one of the most interesting songs to be played tonight. There is now a break between songs which most of the audience take advantage of to buy merch and drinks. Some buy both. Korgis fans are clearly not short of a bob or two!
The Korgis return with a song from their new album. They’re bringing out two albums this year: one with a blue sleeve and one with a red one. “I bet that’s never been done before!” says James. Only with compilations I believe, James. Anyway, this one’s from the blue album, which itself is called ‘UN-United Nations BLUE’. The song is actually an overture and is called ‘Beginnings – Mud Huts’. Every decent album needs an overture apparently.
Another new song is ‘One Way Ticket’, which is about civil rights in the deep south of the USA. This song is quite punchy and it needs to be. Although the Civil Right Act in the USA was passed in 1965, it is still questionable how much actual equality people of colour have in the deep south. John Baker’s keyboards have an air of Billy Joel about them incidentally.
We return to covers with Bonnie Tyler’s ‘Total Eclipse Of The Heart’. Apparently Al Steele and Paul Smith once backed Bonnie Tyler when she sang it. John Baker keeps going on about how it’s one of Danielle’s favourite songs. Danielle retorts that it is absolutely NOT one of her favourite songs. Well, whether she likes the song or not she’s more tuneful than Bonnie and just as powerful.
Next The Korgis revisit their ‘Kartoon World’ album from 2021. For this Al, James and John don some very loud jackets indeed. They’re cartoonish in fact. They play ‘Back In The Eighties’, which sounds like a cross between ‘Jump’ era Van Halen, and Buggles. They stay with ‘Kartoon World’ for ‘This Is The Life’. It’s very funky, and the accompanying film is very thought-provoking, highlighting the increasing distance between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’.
Following this is ‘Dumb Waiters’ from The Korgis’ 1980 album of the same name. James says that they were trying to be punky and the song is “mad and silly”. I disagree. I think that it’s one of the best things that they’ve ever done. They stay with original material for ‘Lost And Found’ which is from the last Stackridge album, ‘A Victory For Common Sense’, which came out in 2009. The chorus is quite riffy, and Al Steele takes a nice synth solo, on top of his peerless lead guitar playing throughout the set. John takes a keyboard solo, and Al replies with a guitar solo. Musically this is one of the most interesting songs of the whole set.
The main set inevitably ends with ‘Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime’, which is their most well-known song by a mile, but is not necessarily their best. It is an undeniable earworm though. I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since the gig!
They don’t bother leaving the stage before the encores, which commence with ‘Boots And Shoes’ from the first Korgis album from 1979. The Roland Orzabal connection is revisited with a cover of Tears For Fears’ ‘Sowing The Seeds Of Love’, which sounds even more Fabs influenced than the original. Tonight Matthew, John Baker is going to be John Lennon!
The final encore is ‘The Best Thing You Can Do Is To Love Someone’, another selection from ‘Kartoon World’. The lead vocals are swapped around between the band’s front row, with some very impressive vocal gymnastics from Danielle. Thus tonight’s Korgis gig ends: with neither a bang nor a whimper, but with a nice high that leaves everybody, band and audience, with a nice glow inside.
The Korgis have given themselves something of a tightrope to walk, with a set that includes so many covers. It would be so easy to veer into cabaret territory, and sometimes they almost do that. However, the quality of the material, both from The Korgis and Stackridge, and the subject matter of many of the songs’ lyrics, prevents that. The Korgis’ music is not cutting edge, and they don’t pretend that it is, but their songs are pleasant, engaging and intelligent. If you’re looking for an evening of nice music made by nice people, The Korgis are your band.
The Korgis:
James Warren – bass, vocals, guitar, keyboards (1978–1982, 1985–1986, 1990–1993, 2005–present)
John Baker – keyboards, vocals, guitar (1980–1982, 1990–1993, 2005–2014, 2017–present)
Al Steele – guitar, keyboards (1993, 2017–present)
Paul Smith – drums (2017–present)
Danielle Nicholls – vocals, percussion, guitar (2023–present)
The Korgis setlist:
Set 1:
1. ‘The Last Plimsole’ – Stackridge
2. ‘If I Had You’ – The Korgis
3. ‘The Only Living Boy In New York’ – Simon & Garfunkel cover
4. ‘Ever Met A Day’ – Graduate
5. ‘Downtown’ – Petula Clark cover
6. ‘If It’s Alright With You Baby’ – The Korgis
7. ‘Solsbury Hill’ – Peter Gabriel cover
8. ‘Letter To Geelong’ – new Korgis song
9. ‘The Good Old Days Of The Cold War’ – new Korgis song
10. ‘Runaway’ – Del Shannon cover
11. ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ – Buggles cover
12. ‘Hold On’ – The Korgis
13. ‘This World’s For Everyone’ – The Korgis
Set 2:
14. ‘Beginnings – Mud Huts’ – new Korgis song
15. ‘One Way Ticket’ – new Korgis song
16. ‘Total Eclipse Of The Heart’ – Bonnie Tyler cover
17. ‘Back In The Eighties’ – The Korgis
18. ‘This Is The Life’ – The Korgis
19. ‘Dumb Waiters’ – The Korgis
20. ‘Lost And Found’ – Stackridge
21. ‘Everyone’s Got To Learn Sometimes’ – The Korgis
(encore)
22. ‘Boots And Shoes’ – The Korgis
23. ‘Sowing The Seeds Of Love’ – Tears For Fears cover
24. ‘The Best Thing You Can Do Is To love Someone’ – The Korgis
