Gigs - Reviews by Fazzman

Gigs - Reviews by Fazzman

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Member	Item		Review/Comment
Fazzman 20th Apr 2023		Live Music The Fatback Band @ California Ballroom (1976)	Review Even after an unbelievable timespan of 47 (whaaaaat?!) years, I can still SO vividly remember that fantastic, hot summer evening of live entertainment by two of the best funk groups around at that time; the incredible 'Fatback Band' and their 'warm up' group of the night, the talented, multi-national fledgling band, 'Heatwave'. Even through the mists of time, I still believe that that hot September night in a memorable summer still ranks as probably the finest gig that I've ever attended in my now-64 years on the planet! Heatwave's Johnnie Wilder Junior was absolutely electric with his superb voice and gymnastic performance, treating the audience to an incredible show of summersaults whilst beating out the vocals......it really was an amazing treat of a gig. Added to that there was also Johnnie's brother Keith Wilder on vocals, a truly international spread of international musicians on their instruments, plus the INCREDIBLE Mr Rod Temperton on keyboards. He would come to the very heights of fame in the years to come, being responsible for not only penning a host of Heatwave tracks but also songs for Michael Jackson and George Benson amongst others. As you can probably tell, my main reason for being at the gig that night was because Heatwave were performing, however, I should also add that superband The Fatback Band were truly in their element too, running through a super-fast catalogue of their tracks, many of which we can still hear - 'Do The Bus Stop' for instance - turning up in the backing of some adverts currently on British TV! In size, the now-defunct Californian Ballroom in Dunstable, Bedfordshire, UK, was really quite small, but boy did they have some of the very BIGGEST bands in the world perform there back in the day! To quote The Four Seasons; OH, WHAT A NIGHT!! 1 person found this review helpful. ✔︎ Helpful Review?