This second show I was going to see turned out to be at a school, Ulmenhofschule, in Kellinghusen, which is a very very small town north of Hamburg, Germany, near Itzehoe. I got to the venue late in the afternoon and had a few words with the organizers and they turned out to be extremely nice people. It's not very often you actually get invited inside the venue before the show by the organizers, is it? They were quite impressed with the fact that I'd come from Denmark to see "their" show, but even more impressed when I told them I'd seen the date on the Internet - Tony Ashton's Homepage to be precise! They told me they'd sold around 60 tickets in advance and would sell a few more on the door. Not the biggest of shows and because the other show I'd seen in Kiel had been in a proper club packed with people and a great atmosphere I didn't have high hopes for this evening. I was wrong however...
The setlist was very different than Kiel, which was great. First of all there was a local blues band warming up so LJB only did one set, but longer than in Kiel. Secondly according to Ashton he's the kind of guy who'll play any songs that come into his mind during the show. For instance Ashton looked rather surprised when he was suddenly given the stage by LJB to do his solo songs.
The setlist:
opening instr. song
Every day I have the blues - Times are getting tougher than tough
One step ahead - the Blackpool pier sketch (LJB & TA)
Shake that thing
Towed down (JLS)
Send me someone to love (JLS)
Baldry's out
A thrill's a thrill
It ain't easy
Hackman's farm (TA)
It's weird (TA)
A right to sing the blues (LJB 12 string gtr)
Backwater blues (LJB 12 string gtr)
Dimples (LJB 12 string gtr)
Black girl (LJB 12 string gtr)
Morning dew (LJB 12 string gtr)
I'm ready
Don't try to lay no boogie woogie on the king of rock'n'roll
Iko Iko - Hand jive - I got rhythm
Hoochie Coochie man
The support band had people warmed up pretty good and a few sound problems during the opening song were soon worked out and LJB arrived on the stage to wild applause from the small audience. I'd had a chance to get more familiar with the story of LJB before the show and could also remember most of the songs from the show two weeks earlier in Kiel and was truly looking forward not just to Tony Ashton's two solo spots this time.
Tony Ashton's performance was much more focussed in Kellinghusen. His two solo numbers were performed excellently, especially the opening piano for Hackman's Farm was great stuff. LJB introduced him as Tony Braxton afterwards and Tony paraded around pretending he had big tits! Obviously he had a lot of beer during the show, but he appeared much more at ease than he had in Kiel. He later explained how the slight animosity he'd felt from LJB at the beginning of the tour had now faded and everybody was having a great time.
Then LJB did a longer acoustic set which, as in Kiel, was fantastic. He takes pretty much a Robert Johnson-ish approach to these songs and does it wonderfully. His version of Dimples was really enjoyable for me and one song I'd been looking forward to was Morning Dew, a song I'd only previously heard in the rather light footed arrangement by Episode Six from the sixties.
Although it was such a small audience and the place wasn't very suitable for concerts the atmosphere still got hotter and hotter as the show gained momentum near the end. LJB's band is a collection of very mature r&b musicians, mostly Americans, with Nigel Portman-Smith on bass and Tony Ashton being the only Englishmen (apart from LJB himself, but he's been living in Canada for years and has adapted an American lifestyle, so...). Again in Kellinghusen did I meet Tony Ashton after the show and despite LJB's instructions to the tour manager not to let Ashton's solo stuff outweigh his own at the CD stall, managed to get copies of both the Grosse Freiheit single and the Big Red EP. Great Ashton pieces both of them, though I wish he'd do a proper album together with some "outside" writers that could open up his writing abilities and make the material more varied. When we'll see him on a proper tour next time is anyone's guess. He's set to do a blues festival in Hell, Norway in September with just a trio, maybe including Portman-Smith and a drummer called Pick Withers (or something), but other than that there doesn't seem to be other gigs lined up. A shame really, as he's a very powerful performer with a great style all of his own.
Rasmus Heide, Denmark
© 1997 stephan@logos.cy.net
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