Sunday 19 October 2014

Live in 2014: Albert Lee - at The Princess Royal Theatre, Port Talbot on Thursday 16th October 2014


This is the first gig of a trilogy of 'Guitar Hero' gigs I've booked myself for this month. And you can't get any bigger a hero than Albert Lee.

Now 70 years old, Albert has played with some of the gretaest names in music, and that's music of ALL genres. His Telecaster playing is the stuff of legend. Although these days he normally sticks to his Music Man Signature Guitar.

photo courtesy of  ThePerfectGuitar.com

So there was NO way I was going to miss this masterclass of guitar playing.

It was a gig of two halves and the set opened with, of all songs, Green Day's Good Riddance - but very much the Country treatment that Glen Campbell recorded for his 2008 album, Meet Glen Campbell.


His fluid guitar playing is a sight to behold and hear. He may be 70 years old but he can't half pick his way through that fretboard. As he has been associated with many of the biggest names in music, he included tracks from some of the legends tonight, as well as his own albums.


Among the great songs that Albert played in tonight's first half were Roseanne Cash's Runaway Train, The Everley Brothers' No One Can Make My Sunshine Smile and Buddy Holly's Learning The Game where Albert displayed his electric piano skills.



He also included Real Wild Child and the Dave Edmonds song - Sweet Little Lisa.



Second half treats included The Traveling Willbury's Handle With Care, Little Feat's Rad Gumbo and Albert returned to his electric piano for a stunning version of the Jimmy Webb classic, The Highwayman.



Albert really showed hat playing the guitar was all about with a cover of Ray Charles' Leave My Woman Alone. 


The set ended with a stunning version of Country Boy which included many of the greatest rock riffs from the last 50 years - just to show all these younger pretenders just how it's done.


For the encore, Albert took to the electric piano again and performed the brilliant Glen Campbell song A Better Place from Glen's equally brilliant album Ghost On The Canvas album.




The show closed with a spirited version of the Johnny Burnette song, Tear It Up.



It was a night of pure virtuosity and showed that Albert should be up there with the British Greats. Will he ever get any recognition from his home country like a Brit award? I doubt it, but those who know, know just how good this man is and in the end, that's all that matters. Oh, and he IS a Grammy winner, so that trumps a Brit Award as far as I'm concerned.

Twitter - @ALeeOfficial



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