Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Location: Tricesimo (Udine) / Interstate Studio 270 / Italy
Concert date: 17.03.2014
Attendance: 70
Ticket price: €20.00
Don Airey will go down in music history first and foremost as the keyboard wizard who stepped in for the legendary, sadly departed Jon Lord after joining Deep Purple, even though he already had a seriously impressive career behind him before 2002, when that landmark moment happened. Classically trained, Airey favors Hammond organ, mini Moog and Kurzweil synthesizer in his keyboard arsenal. After a brief stint with drummer Cozy Powell in the band Hammer in 1974, he first made a real name for himself as a member of the prog/jazz rock fusion supergroup Colosseum II, where he met Northern Irish guitar hero Gary Moore (the two kept working together for years afterward), and then spent a few years in the legendary Rainbow under Ritchie Blackmore.
In the early eighties he was also a member of MSG, fronted by Michael Schenker, and of Ozzy’s solo band, to name just a few of his most impressive gigs. There were simply too many Airey guest appearances with various artists to squeeze into a single sentence. With Whitesnake, for instance, he came on as an associate member and helped create their most successful album, »Whitesnake«, and as a touring member of Jethro Tull in the late eighties he briefly returned to the world of progressive rock, where he comes from as a musician, even though most of his body of work was done in hard rock.
He started his solo path in 1988 with his debut »K2«, followed by three more studio albums. The latest, »Keyed Up« (2014), sees Airey assembling a truly impressive lineup: guitarist Rob Harris (Jamiroquai), bassist Laurence Cottle (Sting, Eric Clapton), drummer Darrin Mooney (Primal Scream) and singer Carl Sentance (Persian Risk, Tokyo Blade and Krokus). After Fish left, Sentance was even on the shortlist to become Marillion’s new singer, before they realized Carl is a hard rocker at heart. With that lineup of fine musicians, Don hit the road in support of the new studio album, and the tour brought him to Udine, which means our neighbors to the west should have been stampeding in droves to see this great member of the legendary Deep Purple. They didn’t.
Attendance was criminally low, with roughly sixty people showing up all told, though given the organizers’ weak promotion and the size of the venue, that wasn’t all that shocking. The club Interstate Studio 270, which by the way demands an annual membership fee even from foreign guests, as if it were some prestigious concert hall, looked more like a freshly painted garage or a mechanic’s workshop than a venue fit for a keyboard legend.
The few passionate music fans packed into the front rows weren’t bothered by any of it, and the moment Mr. Airey took the stage with his band and opened with the new solo track »3 In the Morning«, the atmosphere got seriously lively. The upside of such a small venue is, if nothing else, a far more intimate vibe than usual. It was also a treat (for a change, in a relaxed way) to stand right by the stage and watch the keyboard master’s fingers fly across his vast treasure trove of keys. Quite logically, most of the setlist was built on Don’s solo material, especially tracks from the new album »Keyed Up«, but to the great joy of classic rock fans, Airey’s crew also worked in some Rainbow classics from »Down to Earth« (1979) and »Difficult to Cure« (1981), the two records on which the cult keyboardist left his mark, plus a few very pleasant surprises from rock history.
Singer Carl Sentance has a voice quite similar in timbre to Graham Bonnet’s, so he absolutely ‘set the place on fire’ with the Rainbow evergreens, even on »Spotlight Kid« from »Difficult to Cure«, which was originally sung by Joe Lynn Turner. If he hadn’t gone for such a bizarre hairdo, the kind some modern footballers usually sport, Sentance could pass as the twin brother of The Who’s Roger Daltrey. It was a real feast for the ears to hear unforgettable Rainbow numbers live, like the instrumental »Difficult to Cure«, which this time had a noticeably reworked main arrangement with more emphasis on the Hammond organ, while »All Night Long« was, as expected, mostly about getting the crowd to sing the chorus. Then came a short mini suite, during which Mr. Airey showed off his classical tricks on the keys with a string of brief improvisations. They didn’t reach the scale of his solo spots with Deep Purple, but they still made a big impression on those of us who adore the warm, energetic sound of the Hammond organ. After that, it was time for a tribute to the late friend Gary Moore.
The show happened to fall on St. Patrick’s Day, the Irish national holiday, so the performance of Moore’s classic »Parisienne Walkways« carried even more symbolic weight than usual. Too bad the otherwise excellent guitarist Rob Harris had quite a bit of trouble there, though what was far more annoying was the overly loud drum sound, which started to dominate in the second half of the set. During the »Down to Earth« classic »Lost in Hollywood«, which closed out the main set, the drum volume went past all reasonable limits, and at Don’s signal they had to stop after about half a minute. After the sound engineer stepped in, they played the evergreen again from the top and ‘the way it should be’, and after a short break the crowd happily welcomed the encore.
It took a few seconds for most people to realize which song Airey’s pals had picked for the encore, as they opened the first verse of the classic »Since You’ve Been Gone«, Rainbow’s biggest hit, as a cabaret-style, jazzy version, though the lyrics soon gave it away. Then they played it in its ‘real’ form and delivered one of the highlights of the night. A pleasant surprise was the blues classic »Gimme Some Lovin’«, originally by the Spencer Davis Group. Airey’s band slyly slipped a bit of the Led Zeppelin standard »Dazed and Confused« into it. The show wouldn’t have been complete if Don’s crew hadn’t played at least one Deep Purple classic. Going with »Smoke On The Water« would have been too much of a cliché, so they opted for »Black Night«, which got a super passionate response from the front rows, where most of the support had come from all night. After a modest but heartfelt ovation, considering the crowd size, came a farewell that arrived too soon.
Airey’s band wowed us with Rainbow classics that are nowadays damn hard to catch live even from their original creators, along with solo material, some of it suspiciously close to the Deep Purple sound, and the whole night unfolded in a warm, positive atmosphere. Despite the shabby venue, which simply doesn’t suit musicians of this caliber, and the drum hiccup mentioned above, we witnessed a quality classic rock show, where we admired above all Airey’s keyboard mastery, which once again proved why he was the best possible replacement for Jon Lord, though the whole band earned sincere congratulations for their performance.
Setlist
1. 3 In The Morning
2. A Light In The Sky
3. Solomon’s Song
4. Spotlight Kid
5. Mini Suite
6. Parisienne Walkways
7. Grace
8. Fire
9. The Way I Feel Inside
10. Difficult To Cure
11. Over The Rainbow
12. All Night Long
13. Lost In Hollywood
—encore—
14. Since You’ve Been Gone
15. Gimme Some Lovin’
16. Black Night
Photo Gallery
