THE WHO, Vintage Trouble @LG Arena, Birmingham 28/6/13

If it wasn’t for a song called “Pretty Vegas” Vintage Trouble might not have been here. A few years ago INXS took to a reality show to find their new singer, and one of the four last four was a chap called Ty Taylor. He arguably had the best voice of all the contenders, but another chap called JD Fortune had written the aforementioned “…Vegas” and the Farriss boys wanted it and he won.

Taylor is now the frontman in Vintage Trouble, who are fast rising on both sides of the Atlantic and he is clearly enjoying his chance to open in front of The Who.

He appears to be on a mission to get in as many faces as possible, racing round the arena during “Run Like The River.” Actually, that song perhaps more than any other exemplifies the problems with the band. It is a decent enough soulful blues track, but it is just too busy and there is only so many times you can hear “are you with me Birmingham?” before the relentless positivity starts to grate. At times the vibe resembles a church in New Orleans. It had started well with “Blues Hand Me Down” but they could do with toning down the act. That said, at the end of the show they march offstage high-fiving as they go and are still signing autographs two hours later, so deserve to win friends.

The sold out show tells you that even after nearly 50 years The Who are still a serious big deal. Well might they be too, given that they are in town to play us Quadrophenia in full.

The album as a piece of music is quite brilliant, but set against the show they put on tonight is absolutely jaw-dropping. The giant screens behind them play a film which compliments the music in a quite magnificent way. After “I Am The Sea” kicks us off, “The Real Me” really gets into gear, before the swirling, almost prog instrumental piece of the title track, shows the quality of the musicianship on show.

Given that this record is 40 years old, it is staggering how fresh it still sounds. “5.15” is lifted not only by some excellent horns, but also by a bass solo, played by John Entwhistle on the screen. It is an innovative and touching diversion, and one which is repeated for Keith Moon’s section of “Bell Boy.” The light show is perhaps at its best, though, for “The Rock,” showing a visual history of the world behind them as the music plays.

When “Love Reign O’er” Me” ends things the band stroll to the front and take a break for the first time for an hour and a half. That would have been enough for most bands, but The Who choose to play a selection of hits, including “Who Are You,” “Pinball Wizard” and “Baba O’Reilly,” ending with a visceral “Won’t Get Fooled Again.”

The band disappears at this point, leaving just the two original members, Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey, onstage to play “Tea And Theatre,” behind them is their band’s logo and two pictures of their younger selves, which get bigger as the song progresses, until they fill the screen by the end.

It is a brilliant and strangely poignant way to conclude what has been a truly exceptional night. At times it resembles a production rather than a gig and is all the better for it.

Time has not dulled Townshend’s fire though. “Thanks for coming and not going to Glastonbury,” says Daltrey. “Yes,” sneers the guitarist. “You could have gone to watch The Rolling Stones….”

On this showing, however, you wouldn’t want to. This was of the best gigs you will see all year.

ZZ TOP, The Ben Miller Band @Hammersmith Apollo 24/6/13

It is perhaps ZZ Top frontman Billy Gibbons that sums the Ben Miller Band up best.

The Missouri three piece apparently were handpicked by this evening’s star turn, but it’s not quite that straight forward. “When we saw them,” says Gibbons, “it is not so much a case of where have these guys been, but where have these guys come from!”

The bearded one has a point, because quite clearly the group are something a one off. There is a chap playing the stick bass, the drummer by turns plays the trombone, the washboard and various percussion, while the band leader adds some real old time blues licks over the top.

It also helps that the band are superb. And they take the opportunity to impress 5,000 people with their excellent set. “House of the Rising Sun” is given a real southern twist, while last track “Follow You Down” is real intoxicating stuff.

At 9pm precisely that Little Ole Band From Texas, or as Gibbons again later explains the band who “have been together for 45 years, with the same three guys and the same three chords” take to the stage, doing so with the lead song from their breakthrough album “Eliminator,” “Got Me Under Pressure.”  For the next 80 minutes the aforementioned frontman and his cohorts Dusty Hill and Frank Beard do exactly what they have done for those five decades, which namely is be the best damn boogie band on the planet.

The setlist is tight and clearly well-rehearsed, “Jesus Just Left Chicago” proves their blues credentials, while “Gimme All Your Lovin,’” which is chucked in early in the sort harks back to the time when, perhaps more than any other band, they embraced the early days of MTV and made themselves stars.

Actually, tonight could have been all about nostalgia, but ends up being far from it. Last year the band stuck out a quite brilliant new record. “La Futura” saw Rick Rubin do for Top what he did for Metallica a few years ago and Sabbath in 2013, namely remind them what they were good at, while giving them a new twist.

There are four songs played from “….Futura” the best of which is lead single, “Gotsta Get Paid,” although “Flyin’ High” isn’t far behind, and this gives the show a little more of a modern turn than when last they were on these shores a few years back.

The set ends in the time honored way, the stunning one-two punch of “Sharp Dressed Man” and “Legs.” After this they are back with the rip roaring fun of “Tube Snake Boogie,” a medley which includes “La Grange” and “Bar B Q” before “Tush” ends things as things.

ZZ top – and their sparkly jackets, the main set sees them wear red, while the encores see them resplendent in magnificent purple numbers – were quite brilliant tonight. The sold out show gives you a clue that although those chart bothering days are behind them, the gig going public is still there for them in droves. Quite right too as they are, and most probably will always remain, tremendous fun.

GEORGE THOROGOOD AND THE DESTROYERS, Katmen @Symphony Hall, Birmingham 23/6/13

The Katmen have a serious 1950s obsession. And the three piece are extremely good at what they do. This will come as no surprise when you realise that amongst their members are Slim Jim Phantom, ex of the Stray Cats, and Darrel Higham who plays with Imelda May.

Phantom has been doing this sort of stuff for years and years and he looks thrilled to be here, well he might too, as his band are tremendous fun. They only get half an hour, but you suspect that live is the arena in which they truly shine. Last track “When The Drinks Dry Up” perhaps exemplifies their sound best of all, as it rocks and rolls in extremely exciting way.

Halfway through the opening song “Rock Party” George Thorogood is dancing his way through his guitar solo. He is doing so wearing a bandana and dark glasses. In one fluid movement he removes the specs and chucks them over his shoulder – while still playing the solo and wearing the bandana, which is pretty cool whichever way round you look at it. We are a long way from Joe Bonamassa here, ladies and gentlemen.

If you still need confirmation that Thorogood is a little bit tougher than your average blues singer then it comes after “Help Me.” He tells the crowd: “I have good news, Birmingham. The Destroyers Parole Officers have given them 24 hours off. As they are behaving, I shall be doing everything I can to get arrested this evening, someone should go to jail for rock n roll and it might as well be me.”

Ok, so the police aren’t needed, but as nights on the town go this one is a belter. Thorogood and The Destroyers have been doing this – as the big screen behind them keeps telling us – for 40 years, and it shows. They are slick, they are superb and they know exactly how to work a crowd.

For an hour and 40 minutes, essentially, you are watching tremendous boogie rock. Something akin to Status Quo with a healthy dollop of saxophone. Most of the classics are played “I Drink Alone” and John Lee Hooker’s “One Bourbon One Scotch and One Beer,” sound fantastic, while “Get A Haircut” is big, dumb fun.

Then it happens. Thorogood sneers and says: “I can play all my songs good, but you didn’t come here to hear me play good. You came to hear me play bad.” And with that, he launches into that staple of rock compilation albums from RTM was young (and probably still!) “Bad To The Bone”.

He follows this with Hank Williams, Elmore James and Willie Dixon numbers, before going off for an encore – sort of. What he actually does is sit on a stool and pretend he’s too tired to continue, before launching into a stunning version of “Madison Blues.”With that, he really is done. The National Anthem goes up and Thorogood bows his goodbyes.

You don’t get to be at the top for 40 years without being talented or be a decent showman. Happily Thorogood is both – and will probably be bad to the bone for a lot longer yet.

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN AND THE E STREET BAND, Ricoh Arena, Coventry 20/6/13

Bruce Springsteen is a force of nature. No man of nearly 64 years old has any right to look as sprightly as he does as he races around the stage in Coventry tonight shaming people half his age.

He and the E Street Band had been playing for over an hour already when he casually strolls up the mic and says: “This is our first time in your city and we would like to celebrate by doing something special. We are going to play the "Born To Run album" for you, and would like to dedicate it to our good friend James Gandolfini.”

As you probably know, Springsteen’s sidekick for 40 years, Steve Van Zandt, was one of the stars of The Sopranos, alongside Gandolfini, who had died the previous day and the band clearly wanted to pay tribute.

Whatever the tragic circumstances surrounding its playing, the chance to hear arguably the finest album in the Springsteen cannon (although RTM could go for “Darkness on the Edge Of Town”) in its entirety, is a quite stunning treat. For 50 glorious, spellbinding minutes, right from “Thunder Road” to “Jungleland” and everything in between, the very album that turned the man on stage into a legend is being played.

If he had waved, said “thanks everyone” and walked off after this, you wouldn’t have complained, but this is Springsteen and there is still an hour left yet….

What had gone before “….Run” was superb, but perhaps a touch low-key – understandable given the circumstances (not only has Gandolfini died, but drummer Max Weinberg has lost his mother recently too).

The evening had begun with Springsteen on his own, strumming “The Ghost of Tom Joad” before he is joined the E Street Band for a selection which includes “My Love Will Not Let You Down,” “Two Hearts” and a live debut for “Long Time Comin’.” This last song was a “sign request.” As has become tradition at his gigs, the fans bring signs with them with songs they want to hear and Bruce plays some of them – occasionally inviting people onstage from the crowd to sing their selection with him. A very clever tool, it adds a real personal touch to what in essence can be an impersonal experience, rock n roll after all isn’t meant for stadiums.

Neatly, it is a song about a stadium that provides the highlight of the first section. The title track of his most recent record, “Wrecking Ball” about the Meadowlands Stadium being knocked down, is an astonishingly good song and sits neatly alongside with “greatest hits” like “Hungry Heart” and the “The River” which follow just after.

After the “…Run” interlude, things go up a notch in terms of energy. “Pay Me My Money Down” a particular favourite with the crowd, before "Badlands" concludes the main set finishes the main set with its joyous chorus.

The encores carry things on. Heavy on “Born in The USA” songs, it begins with a plaintive “We Are Alive” and ends around 40 minutes later with “Raise Your Hand” and “American Land.”

There are no gimmicks, no massive light shows and no lasers, just for three hours and 10 minutes some of the finest rock n roll songs ever made. The band seem invigorated since last RTM saw them, with Jake Clemons, replacing his sadly departed Uncle Clarence on saxophone, a real revelation, but the ringmaster is the eponymous hero of it all.

You can argue, possibly, about some of the quality of his recorded output (“Working On A Dream” is fairly terrible for example) but what you can never lose sight of is that there is nothing quite like a Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band show – and damn it all if they didn’t prove it again tonight, because, to be frank, they were quite phenomenal.

SKINNY MOLLY, Mitch Laddie Band, The Mentulls @Robin 2, Bilston 19/6/13

If you have never heard of the young blues troupe Mentulls before (and RTM can count itself amongst that group) then you need to make sure that changes pretty quickly.

Ok, so we only walked into a sparsely populated Robin in time to see their last two songs, but what songs they were! The North East group’s lead guitar player Andrew Pipe, is quite brilliant – we urge anyone to check them out when they are in Birmingham in early November.

Following the almost ridiculously young openers are another North East outfit in the Mitch Laddie Band. Not quite as youthful as The Mentulls, they too are a new name on us at RTM.

They too, largely stick to the blues formula – their second song is a cover of Stevie Ray Vaughan, for example – but add their own little twist, notably with their version of Tower Of Power’s “What Is Hip.” However, most of their hour long set, laudably, is made up of their own compositions. “Paper In Your Pocket” in particular is impressive. Given they are given far longer onstage than they might have expected; the temptation might have been to overplay. They do not – although Laddie is clearly very talented – and theirs is a very enjoyable outing.

Skinny Molly are veritable Southern Rock royalty. Frontman Mike Estes used to be in Lynyrd Skynyrd, appearing on their “Endangered Species” record, while lead guitar slinger Jay Johnson has been in Blackfoot.

Earlier this year they stuck out a new CD, “Haywire Riot,” which not only is the best southern tinged rock album for quite a while, it also makes the last two lukewarm Skynyrd records look a little weak.

They begin with the first track on “….Riot”  “If You Don’t Care” and the bulk of it is played. The lyrical themes do not stray much of the well-worn path. Molly’s is a world where women drive you to drink, you can always get away from them on the open road, and a southern man don’t need you around anyhow – and like the first track says, they “don’t give a damn if you don’t care.” It must also be said that it is world, with plenty of damn good songs. “Two Good Wheels” which deals with all the above, not the least of them.

Estes seems happy to be playing his guitar, greeting every tiny bit of applause with a “thanks y’all” as if he can’t quite believe he is in England playing these songs.

The gig – as these things simply must be if they are going to work – is just good fun. A cover of “Copperhead Road” is casually chucked in as is one of RTM’s absolute favourites “Wishing Well” (which Blackfoot also do).

There is also a refreshing lack of ego too. There is no encore (Estes explains that “if we go off and you don’t shout us back we will be sad.”) so instead they just stay onstage and play a 12 minute version of “Freebird,” which you sort of knew they would and, like you also could have surmised, they make a fine job of it too.

Skinny Molly are not the sort of band to ever change the world, or “challenge” their audience, but they are exactly the sort of band to make the world just a little more fun for the 75 minutes a night they are onstage.

Thanks y’all.

HUGH LAURIE @Symphony Hall, Birmingham 18/6/13

There was a kid like it in everyone’s school.

You know the sort. He was captain of the football team, the cleverest, he got the girl you fancied at the school disco – but you know what? He was so cool and friendly you liked him too.

RTM has never met Hugh Laurie but you suspect that there is an element of that going on with him. From the fresh faced youngster on Jeeves and Wooster on Sunday nights in the 1980s, to the Prince Regent or George in the funniest series’ of Blackadder, Laurie moved on to become the highest paid actor in the world, with House.

Then, he decides to have a go at music and damn him, if he doesn’t do that superbly as well. It is enough to make anyone jealous.

It is tempting to have ago at the actor-turned-musician thing. This, however, is no Stefan Dennis moment. Say what you like about all the bandwagon jumpers in the 1980s and 1990s but the cast of Neighbours never recorded covers of Jelly Roll Morton and Bessie Smith.

This, it seems, is something of a labour of love for Laurie – who has long professed a love of New Orleans Blues and Jazz going back to childhood. And, if his fame in other fields has made this a sold-out show, such a thing will only last if the music is good.

Happily, it isn’t just good. It is absolutely brilliant.

Laurie, let’s face it, isn’t short of a bob or two. This means that he can surround himself with the best possible musicians. He has done that with his quite stunning ensemble The Copper Bottom Band.

They take the stage first, before Laurie, dressed in a long jacket and suit (he claims to be going for the “riverboat gambler” look but jokes he has just about “pulled off snooker player”)and proceed for the next to turn this part of Birmingham into a bar in Louisiana.

The fine horn section, led by Vincent Henry on trombone, is soon into action, with “Iko Iko” kicking things off, before “Let The Good Times Roll” gives us an lengthy monologue from Laurie before an audience participation moment.

The nominal front man of the troupe, Laurie, like on the albums, takes a spell in the shadows, preferring to let the quite magnificent Jean McLean sing a number of tracks. The version of Bessie Smith’s “Send Me To The Electric Chair” is perhaps best of all, but really anything McLean touches this evening is worth the admission price alone.

Covers of “Wild Honey” by Doctor John and Elvis’s “Mystery Train” soon follow, while the first encore, which includes “Go To The Mardi Gras” by Professor Longhair is only just eclipsed by the closer of Ray Charles “Never Can Tell.”

Laurie had announced that it was “the only way to finish the evening.” On this and so many other things, he was spot on tonight. This really was an evening to leave your preconceptions at the door and just celebrate some marvelous music.

Given his day job it is hard to know if Laurie’s reaction is genuine, but throughout he wears a huge grin, frequently looking bewildered as if he can’t quite believe he is being given the chance to follow his dream.

“Bravo” as the Prince Regent might have said. 

IAN HUNTER AND THE RANT BAND, Colin Brown @Leamington Assembly 14/6/13

It is perhaps odd to think that without cover versions RTM might not be here tonight

It was on a Great White album that we first heard “Once Bitten Twice Shy” – of course we had no idea who Mott The Hoople were back then. A little later Bruce Dickinson covered “All The Young Dudes” on his first solo album and Thunder took to doing “All The Way From Memphis”……

At that point it is perhaps natural that the music obsessive has to check these things out. If you don’t understand, then tonight’s support Colin Brown might. He looks like the sort of person who would just have to check out the bands that his favourite artists covered. Brown is the singer in Driven Like The Snow (no, to be honest, us neither…) but tonight he is armed with just a guitar. One of his songs is “Classic 45” and dedicated to anyone who buys vinyl still, while he knocks out a fairly passable version if “Born To Run” which he dedicates to “anyone who is going to see Springsteen at the Ricoh next Thursday.” As a vinyl buyer who is attending that gig, it appears that RTM and Brown would have much to discuss. It is a pleasant rather than amazing way to spend half an hour.

All the investigations after the aforementioned covers led us to the fact that Mott The Hoople were rather marvelous, which in turn led us to the fact that Ian Hunter makes remarkably good solo records. One of these, last years “When I’m President” is quite superb and RTM went to watch Hunter in his acoustic guise play the Wolves Wulfrun Hall back in March.

That was a very fine evening, but this promises to be even better. This is a warm-up for Hunter’s appearance at the Isle Of Wight Festival, and sees him reunited with his rock group, The Rant Band.

The set is broadly similar to the one a few months back – albeit not quite as long – but this sees him playing stuff more akin to his Hoople days, with a real 70s feel to the lead guitar work. Beginning with “Give You What For” from the “….President” record, he is soon into “…Twice Shy” which frolics along.  

Some of Hunter’s solo material is reminiscent of Bob Dylan, and this perhaps best exemplified by “Fatally Flawed” and “Shrunken Heads” both of which reveal a cracked, fragile quality to his voice.

Hunter now lives in the US, and this has informed some of recent material, notably his new albums title track, which sees him wanting to “lean on the 1%” and “stick it to the fat cats” and “Now Is the Time” during which he excoriates the NRA, but his is still a quintessentially British sound – you could only be British to write “…Memphis.”

After ending the main set with the Velvet Underground’s “Sweet Jane,” they are back for a lengthy encore which includes Hoople classics (“Do You Remember) The Saturday Gigs,”and “All The Young Dudes” (with his daughter on vocals), as well his own “Life,” which includes the line “I can’t believe that you are still here, I can’t believe I am still here.”

This is a line laden with all sorts of meanings as Hunter is 74 years old, and has been doing this for over well 40 years. To do it quite so well makes him absolutely remarkable. 

JOE SATRIANI @Wolverhampton Civic Hall 13/6/13

Regular readers of this blog may know that RTM has walked with sticks all its life. This has never really bothered us too much, and we came to terms at an early age with the fact we were never going to score a goal in the cup final for Stoke City, or hit a cover drive at Edgbaston for Warwickshire’s first team. However, there is one thing that has always eaten away at us throughout the years and it is nothing to do with our disability: it is the simple fact that we absolutely cannot play the guitar however hard we try.

RTM mentions this because tonight, apparently for the first time ever (according to the man himself who says so onstage) Joe Satriani is in Wolverhampton for the first time. He is here to play a show in support of his new album “Unstoppable Momentum.” In common with all of Satch’s material, it is brilliant, not quite as unbelievably good as his previous outing “Black Swans And Wormhole Wizards” but brilliant all the same.

Satriani clearly agrees, as during the course of his two hours with us he plays 10 songs from it. The set begins with a short drum solo from Marco Minnemann, playing while the other members of the band – bass man Brian Beller and longtime Satriani sidekick Mike Keneally – wander out, followed by arguably the greatest metal guitarist ever, who stays cool behind his shades throughout. He has his orange guitar, he waves and roars into “Cool #9”

This sets the tone for the next 120 flawless minutes, with the “…Momentum” tracks taking on a fine life of their own, given the chance to breathe in a live setting, with the funky “Weight of the World” sounding particularly fabulous.

For this show Satriani has put together a fine light show, which sees a video wall behind the band augmenting the tracks. “Flying In A Blue Dream” has with it a stunning ocean scene for example and “Shine On American Dreamer” transports us to the Red Rock Canyon and you begin to lose yourself in these songs.

Musically, these tracks share an obvious kinship with RTM’s favourites Dream Theater (Satriani has appeared with their guitar man John Petrucci at the G3 event) and it is tempting on occasion to picture that band playing these songs – and make no mistake these are songs and not just pieces of music. Indeed, this is what sets Satch apart from other musicians of his ilk. He doesn’t overplay, he is not flashy and he constructs tracks that don’t need lyrics better than anyone else in the world.

The evening reaches a quite stunning high point during “Surfing With The Alien” – the big screen showing the incredible sophistication in the playing, before there is an encore of the big dumb fun of “Crowd Chant,” during which RTM spots a chap air guitaring al the way down the steps, being stopped by security, before air guitaring all the way back them. It’s that kind of evening,

It is also an evening where, if RTM could play the guitar we would sell it. We don’t need to play it because we will never be as good as the man onstage tonight. It’s a privilege to be in the presence of genius, but that is exactly what Joe Satriani is.

NEIL YOUNG AND CRAZY HORSE, Los Lobos, @LG Arena, Birmingham 11/6/13

Los Lobos, are known for one song, let’s be frank about this. Everybody knows “La Bamba” and god almighty if the fella next to RTM doesn’t keep shouting for it. “La Bamba” he yells, before looking round first at us, then his mate and grinning.

Said chap had already announced that the band were no good and had no business being on the same stage as Neil Young And Crazy Horse, On this – and it transpired during the course of the evening many other things – this bloke was just plain wrong. Lobos, it actually turned out, were very good indeed. Spanish tinged, as you might expect, but really bluesy, which may come as a surprise. They play a Johnny Thunders song and a chap toots away on a saxophone and they are excellent for 50 minutes. Even better they don’t play the aforementioned hit and our new mate can’t quite believe it. “They didn’t play La Bamba…?” he asks, repeatedly, shaking his head.

He and his mate have disappeared by the time Neil Young and Crazy Horse appear onstage, which is a shame, because RTM needs somebody to explain the opening. Four or five chaps appear dressed as mad scientists and run around. A bloke in an orange jacket then starts lifting the stage set of giant amps, up on a crane and then the band appear while the National Anthem is played. The whole thing, frankly, was pointless and boring appearing unnecessarily self-indulgent. As an indicator for what happened throughout the next 145 tedious minutes, you will not find a better one.

Young opens the set with “Love To Burn” it is an excellent song, but it drags on for well over 10 minutes and appears lost in jamming and feedback, which is clearly how Young wants to play these songs as it happens time and time again.  To our mind this spoils the flow. For example, “Walk Like A Giant” starts off as epic and brilliant, but by the time it ends it becomes drenched in noise as layers and layers of guitars are added over the top.

Oddly, the gig is at its best when all this is stripped away and it is just Young, his acoustic and a mouth organ, “Heart of Gold” and the Dylan cover “Blowin’ In The Wind” are superb – as is the previously unreleased “Singer Without A Song” – one of two new songs that are played, the other “Hole In The Sky” sounds just like Nils Lofgren -  which features Young tinkling away on his piano.

After this things go awry, “Ramada Inn” goes on and on (and on) and “Fuckin Up” which had started well, begins to annoy us during the 10 minute call and response section. “Cortez The Killer” and “Hey Hey My My” redeem things slightly, but to be blunt, RTM is bored before the encore of “Powderfinger”

This is the first time we have seen Neil Young And Crazy Horse. There won’t be a second. A night that promised much and delivered annoyance.

“La Bamba”, as the bloke who was next to us at one point is probably still saying. 

BON JOVI @Villa Park 9/6/13

Forgive the unusually personal blog here (I very rarely write in the first person) but it is highly probable that without Bon Jovi, Rocking The Midlands would not exist.

In the summer of 1986, I was 10, nearly 11 when I was sitting in my room, taping the best songs on the top 40 like we all did every week when something came shooting out of the speakers: “Shot through the heart,” came the voice, “and you’re to blame – you give love a bad name.” A couple of weeks later there was another track on the radio. You might know it, it starts “Tommy used to work on the docks….”

That week, I gave my mum my pocket money and she went to Discovery Records in Solihull to purchase – on vinyl – an album called “Slippery When Wet” and a rocker was born. In 1988 for my thirteenth birthday I was given the bands fourth album – a record called “New Jersey” which I still consider to be the finest record of its type ever made, it is – quite simply – the perfect hard rock album.

It is twenty years since the band played Birmingham. That show, in May 1993 was the second proper gig I had been to and it was absolutely incredible. And (again, asking for forgiveness for the personal thoughts) in 2009 when my aforementioned mother was buried, it was “Livin On A Prayer” that was played as filed out of the funeral room. It had been her favourite song. It is still one of mine.

Let no one be in any doubt that, whatever else I am, I am absolutely not a Bon Jovi hater. I owe them many things, I owe them my love of rock music and years of happiness. I owe them the last happy memory of mum, days before she died, listening to the band and being genuinely content for maybe the last time,  so you had better really believe me when I say it is with heavy heart I have to write what follows.

I didn’t know whether to get a ticket for this show. I had seen them (along with my best mate – with whom I have been friends for slightly longer than I have loved Jovi) a few years before at the O2 Arena and, whilst the show was ok, we said we wouldn’t go again as it was tarnishing our memories. But this, this was cheap (my seat cost £25), it was at Villa Park (about five miles from my house) and it was Jovi. Jovi, my band, my boys, before Skid Row, before The Wildhearts, before Maiden, before them all and I couldn’t say no….

I thought about not going when I heard the utterly execrable, appallingly bad new record “What About Now” from which about five songs are played during the course of the three hour set including opener “That’s What The Water Gave Me.” It sums up the band in 2013. It is safe, homogenized pop music, which is designed not to offend anybody and be played on Radio 2. The band would no doubt say that they have grown up, but briefly, with 1995’s superb “These Days” album they moved into a really interesting new direction, before eschewing that in favour of MOR pop with the occasional flash of talent like “It’s My Life” (which is played tonight) and “Last Man Standing” (which isn’t)

The elephant in this particular stadium is that Richie Sambora isn’t here. Always my favourite member of the band and definitely the coolest, he has fallen out with Jon and replaced by Phil X. X is a decent fill in, but he isn’t Sambora, any more than this is the band I used to love.

Once or twice – when they play “Dry County” for example in the encore, the band are fantastic, but for the rest of it, they are just another pop band, and if they weren’t called what they were called then I wouldn’t be here.

Of course, they play “….Prayer” and they do so twice, more or less, with Jon doing an acoustic rendition before the band plays the whole thing. And it sounds like a cover to me, it lacks the excitement it used to – but then I am clearly in a minority of one, given that all around me 30,000 people go mental.

Fittingly the last song is “Blood On Blood” – a track about lost youth and sticking together through adulthood in spite of never seeing each other anymore – as a metaphor it seems just about perfect for my thoughts on the band who are playing it. Like its first line says: “I can still remember, when I was just a kid…”

Thanks for everything Bon Jovi, we had a good run, and part of me will always love you. This time, though, it is over. 

BILLY BRAGG, Wes Finch @Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford 2/6/13

This, it must be said, is a fantastic venue for a gig. RTM hasn’t been here for about 25 years – then our teenage selves were more concerned with messing about with the binoculars than we were with actually watching “Romeo And Juliet”, but now, as (definitely) older and (hopefully) wiser, we find ourselves with a quite stunning view of proceedings.

Possibly Wes Finch was a touch overawed too by it all too. Because he seems just a little timid during his opening numbers, with “Pinch of Salt” in particular, you feel, having the potential to be a decent melancholy folk song, but lacking something.

Then midway through his 45 minute set, something happens. He plays a gritty, bluesy, Robert Johnson cover and all of a sudden he’s off and running. “Ring On The Riverbed” is a tale of lost love and “The Punchline” is likewise, a fine song. You can almost see the confidence flooding through him and Finch’s set is one that ended up way better than it started.

If Billy Bragg has ever lacked confidence he’s never shown it in all the times RTM has seen him. And – backed with a band for more than half two hours he’s on stage tonight – he is pretty unstoppable.

This jaunt (tonight at the RSC is the first date on his UK tour) is in support of his new recprds “Tooth and Nail”. In RTM’s opinion it is a real return to form after the patchy “England Half English” and “Mr Love And Justice” albums that he’s put out in the last decade. That is reflected in tonight’s performance, which sees around half of it played. Bragg hasn’t sounded this good – or appeared this energised -  in years.

Beginning with one of his political numbers in “Ideology” he is soon aplogising to the bard for his grammar in the track “No One Knows Nothing Anymore” by track three is playing one his many Woody Guthrie songs in “Way Over Yonder In The Minor Key” – and that in a nutshell is Bragg summed up. No one else can shift so effortlessly or so well between different styles, from singer/songwriter to Folk to Rock to almost punk, so easily well and no one can do political songs and shift to love songs quite so skillfully.

There are those who think that Bragg has gone soft in his older age and that he doesn’t write scathing attacks on the right wing political beliefs anymore. He plays “Between The Wars” (dedicated to Margaret Thatcher) and as if to prove he has still got the fire, he follows it up with his condemnation of the modern tabloid press “Never Buy The Sun.”

More than anything, though, tonight is a fun gig with a real warmth at its heart. Encoring with the lead track from “…Nail” “Handyman Blues” a tale of his hopelessness at DIY (which contains the fabulous line “I know you think I’m just reading the paper/But these ideas I will turn to goldust later” ) before singing off with the classic “Waiting For The Great Leap Forwards” this really has been a night to remind yourself that Bragg is still absolutely, totally relvant.

Like the tea towel (no, really) he is selling in the foyer says, Bragg is marmite. You love him or hate him. Of course, we are in the former camp. And to paraphrase his most famous song (one which is not played tonight) Bragg doesn’t want to change the world, he’s just looking for a better England – and entertaining while he does it. And he is superb tonight. 

ELVIS COSTELLO AND THE IMPOSTERS @Symphony Hall, Birmingham 31/5/13

RTM saw Elvis Costello for the first time last year. Same venue, same set up. A big wheel on stage members of the audience spinning said sphere and Elvis and band playing whatever it lands on, while spinner watches the song from the on stage bar. It is all very relaxed.

In our review of the 2012 show, we wrote that we didn’t expect to see “a lady dancing in a cage wearing a short purple dress and knee length boots” during the course of a singer/songwriter evening. The lady, the boots and cage are back this time too, but this year what shocked us was Costello himself. Towards the end of this mammoth two and a half hour show, he plays “I Want You” and during in the song, he rips out an absolutely stunning guitar solo. If nothing else, it proves that his gigs always have the power to surprise.

The rest of it was pretty damn good too. He and his band The Imposters began with “I Can’t Stand Up For Falling Down” and also played the always welcome “Radio Radio” before the first audience member, given the chance to “come from the stalls to the stars” as host for the evening Napoleon Dynamite puts it spins “Oliver’s Army” which is played with a slightly altered arrangement. That “Dynamite” actually is Costello with a different hat on tells you all you need to know about the evening.

Hostess “The Mysterious Josephine” plucks some more people out of the crowd and “Pump It Up” is a winner, someone else wants to hear “Good Year For The Roses” doesn’t spin it, but it is played anyway.

Around half the songs are audience picks, which says much for the abilities of Imposters to play such a repertoire, while others are chosen by Costello himself (“If you can’t cheat in Birmingham, then where can you cheat?” he says with a grin)

The main set closes with “Tramp The Dirt Down” a song which you suspect has just a touch more resonance this year, but the band are far from finished. During “Watching The Detectives” Costello goes for a stroll around the crowd, picks three more people out for another spin, plays “(I Don’t Want to Go) To Chelsea and a fantastic and plaintive “Shipbuilding” but still isn’t done. A second encore which includes “Out Of Time” and “(What’s So Funny About) Peace, Love And Understanding” is what actually ends things.

Only an artist with a fine and extensive back catalogue could pull a show like this off. And only one with supreme confidence in their songs would try it. Far more than just a conventional gig, this is a extravaganza which takes elements of comedy (Costello is genuinely funny on occasion), variety, fairground and old style entertainment, and you cannot say fairer than that. It would be nothing without the songs, however,  but as everyone knows Costello has good ones in spades.

Quite superb – and unlike the last time we saw this show, we knew that it would be.