Theater am Marientor, Duisburg, Germany
1st June 2011
Mike & The Mechanics
MIKE & THE MECHANICS are a British rock band formed in 1985. It’s the band of GENESIS guitarist and songwriter Mike Rutherford. When singer Paul Young died in 2000 the band’s future was unclear for quite some time, even though they had several albums released and a plethora of hits under their belt such as ‘All I Need Is A Miracle’ ‘Another Cup Of Coffee’ or most notably ‘Over My Shoulder’. Eventually it all turned out good the band came back reformed and with fresh energy that resulted in the new album ‘The Road’, they were going to present amongst others at this evening’s start of the tour in Duisburg.
Music & Performance
Good weather, good mood and a theatre being the venue for the show of MIKE & THE MECHANICS promised to be an interesting evening, even though a theatre isn’t quite the place you’d expect a pop-rock ensemble to play, but it was a nice way to kick-off the tour in support of the new album ‘The Road’, and it was the title track to start the whole show with the band walking in and Mike already playing. Andrew Roachford impressed with his mellow timbre on the track and made for quite a stirring opening. The next one on the list ‘A Beggar On a Beach Of Gold’ is a classic in the catalogue and Tim Howar’s trained voice suited the melancholy-tinged track greatly. For a moment away from plaintive feelings with ‘Get Up’, though the song missed its effect getting people up, but at least got them clapping along either sitting or in rare cases standing.
A cover of the GENESIS song ‘I Can’t Dance’ had everyone in the room cheering aloud and when the set’s end drew nearer and ‘Over My Shoulder’ came up there was no sitting possible anymore for anyone. Andrew involved the audience in the further course with letting them sing the chorus together with him and they, admittedly, did pretty well. The big party at the venue would break, however, with ‘All I Need Is A Miracle’ arising as the main set’s closer and people dancing, as far as dancing goes in those rows. The band wouldn’t even leave completely to be called back later. Andrew riled them up to do “Zugabe” shouts to unlock a little encore set of two songs ended with ‘Word Of Mouth’ and an increasingly happy audience that had just witnessed great closing of the evening.
Setlist
01. The Road
02. A Beggar on a Beach of Gold
03. Get Up
04. Try to Save Me
05. Nobody Knows
06. Another Cup of Coffee
07. I Don't Do Love
08. If I Were You
09. Only to Be With You (Roachford cover)
10. Follow You Follow Me (Genesis cover)
11. I Can't Dance (Genesis cover)
12. The Living Years
13. Over My Shoulder
14. All I Need Is a Miracle
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15. Cuddly Toy (Roachford cover)
16. Word of Mouth
Rating
Music: 8
Performance: 9
Sound: 9
Light: 9
Total: 8.6 / 10
All pictures by Daniela Vorndran (http://www.vorndranphotography.com / http://www.black-cat-net.de/ / www.myspace.com/vorndranphotography / www.facebook.com/blackcatnet)
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