SharePaul Carrack performing his How Long 50th Anniversary Tour at The Royal Concert Hall Nottingham on Friday 27th September 2024.
Images and Review by Kevin Cooper
Touring to celebrate a phenomenal 50 years of his musical career with the release of his new album How Long Has This Been Going On? Greatest Hits, Paul Carrack was at the Royal Concert Hall on Friday night for what is fast becoming his annual pilgrimage to the city.
With an immense back catalogue from his time with the likes of Ace, Squeeze, Roxy Music and Mike + The Mechanics as well as a very successful solo career, it was the wonderfully smooth Satisfy My Soul that opened the show that saw the soul singer, writer and purveyor of songs that are deep in the DNA of pop history, deliver a seventeen song set list.
The partisan crowd began an emotional journey with follow up songs Life In A Bubble, Eyes Of Blue and When Love Is Blind. With a very tight band which saw impressive bass playing from Jeremy Meek, thrilling guitar work from Andy Staves and some spine-tingly saxophone breaks from Steve Beighton, the sound was taken to even greater heights with excellent drumming from Jack Carrack, and of course there was the man himself switching between guitar and piano delivering his songs with lyrics that the crowd have always resonated with.
There was an astonishingly stunning version of Love Will Keep Us Alive which was a real highlight followed by a cover of Van Morrison’s Into The Mystic. The Grammy award nominated The Living Years was a quiet tender emotional song which never fails to mesmerise and which brought the crowd to their feet in appreciation, where they stayed for a mass sing along to Squeeze’s Tempted.
The Jackie De Shannon classic When You Walk In The Room saw the crowd up dancing which was ramped up for the set closer, the rousing How Long. They were back on for the wonderful Over My Shoulder and Set Me Free that saw Carrack confirm his universal appeal that has never waived during the last fifty years.
