Don McLean
at the Royal Albert Hall, London - May 13th 1975 DON McLEAN DOESN'T CROON - HE DEMANDS
The vast formality of the Albert Hall. A large empty stage. One lone spotlight. A guitar, a banjo and one man. A triumph! If it sounds dramatic, you're right. This man is a force. He doesn't croon, he commands. Where others woo the audience in the name of entertaining, McLean goes further. He wounds, warms and clears out all those cobwebs you didn't realise you were still harbouring. There are few artists who can present an hour and a half's worth of material that hits hard with such consistency. The lights had barely dimmed in the hall when McLean calmly mounted the stage. To avoid distractions and requests later, he wisely opened with his favourite albatross, 'America Pie'. By the third chorus, his backing chorus of 6,000 were doing so well with the melody that he provided the harmony. This was a practice he employed later in 'La La Love You', a little ditty called 'You Can Bite A Watermelon Above My Grave, And Let The Juice (Slurp) Slip Through', and a haunting rendition of 'Babylon' which the house sang in rounds. Overall, McLean's mood came over as less cynical than reported in recent years. He seemed to delight in his skill of being able to lift the audience up into the skies and then with one breath of impact and tone, be able to plunge one's mentality into something much more serious. 'Dreidel', 'Magdalene Lane', 'Muleskinner', a medley of of the champagne bubbly 'Wonderful Baby', 'Birthday Song' and 'You Have Lived' had the place quiet enough to hear a cotton ball drop. 'The Amazon Is Calling Me' displayed McLean's sorely understated ability to twist words into a ridiculous combination and at the same time make sense. He is a master of timing. Not only in building and rebuilding moods but in the texture of each individual song. He is much funnier in person than one can sense on record. In concert, all the sharp edges are on show. He closed with Buddy Holly's 'Everyday' and 'It Doesn't Matter Anymore', and as with the rest of the good taste he displayed that evening, satisfied a gracious audience without stopping too early or laying on too much. McLean is one of those few people who do not need the timeliness of a hit record to remind people of his talent. His name has always been synonmous with quality. And he ain't gonna be blowing it on this tour judging by the kick off concert. ROBIN KATZ Don McLean
at the Royal Albert Hall, London - May 13th 1975 ALMOST SAYING BYE-BYE TO AMERICAN PIE
Why should Don McLean have chosen to open his Albert Hall concert - and with it his first British tour for eighteen months - with his tour de force, 'American Pie'? The man from 'The Times' concluded that it evinced a paucity of worthy material ('Had he taken a single step forward from there?'): since that can hardly be more inaccurate, we must look for an alternative explanation; no doubt Don would like to put the song on the substitute's bench for a season, but probably realises he has virtually a duty to perform it, and thus does so, while also getting it out of the way at the earliest opportunity. It must be difficult for him to raise enthusiasm for 'American Pie', and it's certainly lengthy for an opening song, but it does allow not only him, but also the audience - all word perfect - to flex their vocal chords. He enjoins audience support consistently during the evening. Since 'Pie' was followed immediately by 'Dreidel', which I've always found an unsatisfactory song of self-conscious artiness, that really cleared the decks, and after that the concert developed into one of the most relaxing and consistantly enjoyable I've attended. He's a most economical performer in every way: the stage is bare, except for a chair and a glass of water, and he accompanies himself on guitar and banjo. He doesn't move about a lot, and doesn't intersperse his songs with lengthy raps - he just gets on with the job, fluently but assiduously. With material from five albums to choose from - and he included something from each of them - he has now developed a full repertoire of his own, which is given body by a selection of more traditional songs, his banjo playing is really dexterous, as was demonstrated on 'Muleskinner Blues', likewise his guitar work is deft and sure, his vocals rich and clear: you feel there are few limits to what he could include. There were four numbers from the debut album, 'Tapestry', 'Respectable', 'And I Love You So' (which has recently been recorded by Elvis Presley) and 'Magdalene Lane', which he introduced as ''a song about Los Angeles - that's the city of Manson and Nixon''; the quality of these only enhanced the illogicallity of the fact that, as the programme reminded us, 34 record companies turned down the album. McLean simply switched guitar for banjo for various songs, and delivered a rich variety of material, which included a few gospel styled numbers "Oh Mary Don't You Weep', 'This Little Light Of Mine' and 'Babylon', the traditional and wonderfully tranquil song which McLean first included on the 'American Pie' album. He encored with 'Everyday' and 'It Doesn't Matter Anymore' (which he announced as Holly's first and last, but wasn't 'That'll Be The Day' the first?), the only contemporary songs which he hadn't composed - with the further exception of 'Masters of War', a surprising and not altogether successful choice. Although McLean made musical sense of the song, the sulphuric anger of the lyrics seemed conspicuously aberrant in an evening devoted to material of a more gentle nature. (Admittedly he himself consciously accentuated this impression by going straight into one of his songs of charming innocence, the lullaby 'Wonderful Baby'). All in all, though, a memorably fulfilling evening. McLean played for 90 minutes - there are lots of songs I haven't mentioned, lots of comments about the way we live now, social, political or ecological, I've not referred to. BOB WOFFINDEN Don McLean
at the Royal Albert Hall, London - May 13th 1975 McLEAN's POIGNANT PIE
Few, if any, major artists walk on stage and plunge straight into the song that catapulted them to fame and which for better of worse, will haunt them for ever. Frank Sinatra would hardly come right out and sing 'My Way', Led Zeppelin are unlikely to come out and do an extended version of 'Whole Lotta Love'. But Don McLean went immediately into 'American Pie' at his sell-out concert at London's Royal Albert Hall last Tuesday. Which means either that he loves the song, wants it to represent him for ever more, and uses it as an identification mark - or that he wants to get rid of it early on in his show to avoid it hanging over him like some monster which won't go away. Either way, it was a clever and courageous piece of planning, and with an extended version of 'American Pie' over, the McLean performance could continue, putting the accent on the man and his material. No one had to sit through new songs asking themselves: "Wonder if he'll now sing 'American Pie'." McLean has an extraordinary voice. He writes extremely poignant songs, and is quite clearly in the 'message business'. Yet he's no laid-back troubadour who mutters into his mike hoping you'll realise he's a genius with the world's problems solved by his lyrics - McLean is also quite heavily into showbiz, and his reliance on audience singalongs is highly unnerving, first time around. His standard of talent stands alone, and we had gone to see, hear and enjoy because we knew his work and wanted to hear him in person. Audience participation devalued his material. McLean has a unique gift, writing songs which appear soft and fragile, but which on closer inspection often have a sting. His commentary on life in the plastic city of Los Angeles was particularly striking, and he interpreted the Bob Dylan classic 'Masters Of War' - relevant yet again in the light of Vietnam - with all the irony and pungency demanded by the song. 'And I Love You So', the breathtakingly lovely 'Vincent', and his warm new single, 'Wonderful Baby' are testimonies to his highly refined and unique style. Throughout his show, Don had a tight grip on his audience, and demonstrated a bright banjo style as well as a mellow guitar. It was a thoroughly satisfying performance. RAY COLEMAN |
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