The encore was an a cappella/barbershop quartet version of “Donna” that was utterly spectacular, the best thing I’ve seen all year.
But you’ve probably never heard the original.
10cc was a band nobody wanted that was signed by Jonathan King, of “Everyone’s Gone to the Moon” fame, and its initial album came out on King’s “UK” label via Mercury in the States and there was no airplay but plenty of ink, and if you were a dedicated follower of print you were intrigued and bought it.
At least I did.
I had to hear the track that went to number one in England, “Rubber Bullets.”
“I went to a party at the local county jail
All the cons were dancing and the band began to wail”
It sounded like nothing so much as the Beach Boys, who at this point had lost the formula. It was like hearing a new Beatles song, completely unexpected, but oh so fine.
“Load up, load up, load up with rubber bullets
I love to hear those convicts squeal
It’s a shame these slugs ain’t real”
And there was a sense of humor to boot. 10cc evidenced an intellectual quality while the airwaves were being ever more dominated by meat and potatoes and corporate rock. They were almost too good for the airwaves.
“Sheet Music,” the band’s second album, started with a delineation of finance almost a full decade before the audience caught on, before Reagan legitimized greed and everybody was doing the “Wall Street Shuffle.”
But “Sheet Music” had even less commercial impact in the U.S., if that was possible, and then came “The Original Soundtrack” and “I’m Not In Love.”
Now normally when you go to see an act of seventies hitmakers, that’s just what people want to hear, the hits. You know, the songs that crossed over to Top 40, and during the rest of the set the audience talks, goes to the bathroom, eats.
But not Thursday night.
If you weren’t a fan of 10cc, if you didn’t know the albums, you weren’t in attendance. It was a convocation of music nerds, those who lived for the music, and knew every note. How else could you start with “The Second Sitting for the Last Supper,” an album cut if there ever was one. It’d be like Paul McCartney starting the show with “You Gave Me the Answer” from “Venus and Mars,” hard core fans would be thrilled, and casual fans would be completely flummoxed. But like I said, there were no casual fans there Thursday night.
But there was cognitive dissonance. What was once a band of four now only has one original. You heard Eric Stewart’s parts, but they were sung by this young bloke with a high voice and intellectually it was not easy to swallow.
And then came “Art for Art’s Sake.”
And I couldn’t help throw my hands in the air.
“Art for art’s sake
MONEY FOR GOD’S SAKE!”
I was grabbed by the music and brought right back to 1976, only this was 2024, and it felt just as vital as it did back then. And just as meaningful.
There are no bands like 10cc. You can’t compare them to anyone. And therefore their music has never dated. It’s as fresh as it ever was, waiting to be discovered or reconnected with whenever you hear it.
Now I was on the boat, on the cruise, I’d left all preconceptions behind, because I was hearing a song I knew by heart that was more than a ditty, all these years later, after all, 10cc hadn’t performed live in the U.S. since ’78, at the Santa Monica Civic, I was there, I can even tell you where I sat, and the fact that when I got home my girlfriend was in bed and feigning sleep, she didn’t want me to to.
But I had to.
But the pièce de résistance was “Feel the Benefit.” The last song on 1977’s”Deceptive Bends,” when it was now two, after Godley and Creme had left to pursue their work with the Gizmotron.
There was less humor on “Deceptive Bends,” but there was a slice of pure pop that was undeniable, that you only had to hear once, “The Things We Do for Love.”
A sing-songy number straight out of the middle sixties I thought was a takeoff on that era, but Graham Gouldman has assured me it was written straight, all I know is it’s a master class in songwriting, right down to the bridge.
“Ooh, you made me love you
Ooh, you’ve got a way
Ooh, you had me crawling up the wall”
And when you love a song so much you play the album to death. Which is how I know “Feel the Benefit.” At this point it’s the 10cc record I play the most, the one I sing in my head.
Now the thing is “Feel the Benefit’ is a minor symphony, over eleven minutes long, the kind of number you never expect to be played live, like something from “Sgt. Pepper,” impossible to replicate.
But Thursday night 10cc hit every note.
Stewart may have been gone.
But Rick Fenn and Paul Burgess were there, band members for decades. And Fenn is an absolute master, from the era when guitar heroes were a dime a dozen and therefore someone like Rick didn’t get the attention he deserved.
It was positively astounding, the notes, the sounds he was wringing from his guitar. Not to mention Keith Hayman’s work on the keys. And then two-thirds of the way through Graham Gouldman pulled off a bass solo that showed he was more than a songwriter, MUCH MORE!
It was mesmerizing. It garnered a standing ovation. And not the only one.
Like I said, the audience knew the material.
The venue wasn’t completely full, but I was stunned how many hard core devotees there were of this music. Which was not cool like Jane’s Addiction, that wasn’t for boys only like Rush, but hit you in the head as well as the heart.
We were all on the same train. We were on a private journey, and the rest of the world did not matter. I read that Sabrina Carpenter just played the Forum, there’s all this hoopla over Chappell Roan, but they can’t hold a candle to what 10cc was…and now still is.
You see this music worked on its own, it didn’t need chart success to give it an imprimatur of greatness. The band took the sixties and synthesized them into something new.
I won’t say you had to be there, because if you did, YOU PROBABLY WERE!
It was strange. The original lead singer, one of the best in the business, was absent, but it was a religious experience nonetheless. You see there was the playing, but even more there were the songs.
You couldn’t help but have a smile on your face.
It was a private thing, but for everybody in attendance.
We were all celebrating the band, even those in it.
And then came the encore of “Donna.”
The initial 10cc album was akin to Zappa’s “Ruben and the Jets.” It hearkened back to the sounds of yore, but with a twist, with humor.
“Donna” in its original incarnation was a doo-wop parody. Not something you expected to hear live, then again I didn’t expect to hear “The Dean and I” either.
And I’d be honest if I said I wasn’t dying to hear “Donna” Thursday night, I was hoping for “Old Mister Time” or some other deep cut from “Bloody Tourists.”
There’s not a ton of instrumentation on the recorded “Donna,” but there were no instruments at all Thursday night.
It was the first encore, before the closing “Rubber Bullets.”
The band stood around one mic, like Dion and the Belmonts and every street corner group of the late fifties.
“Whoa, Donna
You make me stand up
You make me sit down Donna”
In this case Andy Park nailed the falsetto lead vocal and the rest of the members supported him, and they were smiling, almost laughing, and you were standing there, just waiting for them to hit a bad note, to fail, BUT THEY NEVER DID! IT WAS ABSOLUTELY PERFECT!
The band cast a spell. And needless to say, when it broke, the audience exploded.
This had nothing to do with rock, had nothing to do with hits, had nothing to do with whether you knew the number, this had to do with MUSIC! Which was what enraptured us all those years ago.
The show was over and I wanted to see it again. I wanted to concentrate on what I missed, I wanted to luxuriate in this music once more, I wanted the high to continue.
I found it nearly impossible to fall asleep. Because of the pure joy. It wasn’t about shooting selfies, telling anybody I’d been there, but just being there myself, in the moment.
You can’t really ask for much more.
