| By Orren Merton We showed up in time for a few songs from Mike Peters’ (ex-Alarm singer) solo acoustic set, and he seemed pretty engaging. After that, Gene Loves Jezebel, with I guess Michael Ashton fronting. I'm not enough of a Jezebel fan to know which version is "authentic" or "better" or anything, but I think Michael is the one who wrote more of the tunes, and Jay did more singing. Anyway, I'm not crazy about the high pitched wailing that he goes into, but hearing Kiss of Life and the medley of old hits (Motion of Love/Jealous/Josephine) and Desire was fun, and the band played well. When The Mission finally came on, I noticed that Wayne looked the same as when I saw him guest with Gary Numan, and Craig looked the same from when he played with The Cult, but I had no idea whom the other 2 musicians were. The guitarist was quite good, and my guess is that he was the "Thistwhistle" boy or whatever his name was who has played with Wayne on and off since the Masque album. If I'm not mistaken, if that was the guitarist, I think its Lemmy of Motorhead's son. This was a much lower-tech tour then when I saw them twice in 1990, as there was no keyboard or rack of goodies and gadgets on stage, just the amplifiers and drum kit they shared with Gene Loves Jezebel and some sort of DAT/mini-disc taped programming offstage. The show was so low-tech that it seemed the old Fender amp that Wayne/Michael were sharing kept giving both of them (and the soundman) problems, and was often hard to hear. The energy, however, was still there, all these years later. Wayne has always been a showman, and he did not disappoint. Making references to being happy to be back in his hometown, seeing his daughter, and loving the crowd, he pranced around every inch of the stage and proved that he could still rock as well as ever. Craig was also full of life and the whole band seemed to really be enjoying themselves, which in turn energized the crowd. He even had a show of hands at one point for which older song we wanted to hear, "Garden of Delight" or "Blood Brother" (I voted for Blood Brother, which was selected). While they played one song from each of their later-90s records, the vast majority of their stuff was from their early days through Grains of Sand--which seemed fine with the crowd. In fact, they incorporated a snippet of "Marian"--perhaps my favorite song Wayne wrote for the Sisters of Mercy--as the intro to "Wasteland," and the crowd just ate it up. Ending with a very loose and punky blow-out-all-the-stops cover of Iggy's 1969, both the band and the audience left energized. All in all, The Mission were always a band in my opinion that were at their best on stage, and this show kept up their tradition. If The Mission play any upcoming shows, I'd highly recommend going. THE SET LIST (I'm pretty sure) Beyond The Pale Hands Across the Ocean Into The Blue Butterfly On A Wheel Raising Cain Blood Brother Blue Severina Tower of Strength Deliverance FIRST ENCORE I Can't Help Falling In Love With You (Elvis cover) Like a Child Again (2 attempts, then aborted) Dancing Barefoot (Patty Smith cover) Like A Hurricane (Neil Young cover) SECOND ENCORE Marian/Wasteland 1969 (Iggy Pop cover) |