Squeeze - Hexagon, Reading - November 15th 2010 (Live Review)
Monday, 06 December 2010
Written by Matthew Williamson
1974 saw Chris Difford, Glenn Tilbrook, Jools Holland and Paul Gunn form the band that was to become known as Squeeze. Although never becoming a permanent feature of 70s/80s music they had numerous songs in the top 50. Today they’re playing to a sold out crowd at The Hexagon in Reading.
However the slightly younger Lightning Seeds are up first. The crowd are polite enough. Many of them are fans of the band, although they never really get going. The band are only given about half the stage and they don’t have the stage presence to pull off a great show. Hits such as ‘Lucky You’, ‘Life of Riley’ and ‘Pure’ do get some people singing but the set ends without major incident.
The reception for Squeeze is, naturally, better. Kicking off with ‘Black Coffee in Bed’ Tilbrook looks in fine form. Not bounding about the stage, he may be slightly too old for that, but his passion does seem to lift the crowd. Difford looks slightly more rigid, and as if he doesn’t want to be there, reading words from the iPad that he places in front of himself.
They follow this up with debut single ‘Take Me, I’m Yours’ which gets slightly more from the crowd, but the main energy is still onstage. In fact the first time it really lifts is halfway through the set with ‘Up The Junction’, one of two songs that reached #2 in the charts. The same goes with ‘Labelled With Love’, which charted at #4. It’s the first time that Difford really looks at home, taking off his glasses and moving about the stage a little.
‘Hourglass’ gets a decent enough reception before the band finish up with a flawless rendition of ‘Cool for Cats’, which gets the best reception of the night. The band members each being introduced by Tilbrook allows the band to show of what great musicians they are. A short break before the band comes on to finish up with ‘Another Nail In My Heart’ and ‘Pulling Muscles (From The Shell)’. The crowd seem happy enough with the performance as they file out of the hall back into the evening fog.
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The reception for Squeeze is, naturally, better. Kicking off with ‘Black Coffee in Bed’ Tilbrook looks in fine form. Not bounding about the stage, he may be slightly too old for that, but his passion does seem to lift the crowd. Difford looks slightly more rigid, and as if he doesn’t want to be there, reading words from the iPad that he places in front of himself.
