STACKRIDGE
entertain the few

On Thursday 13th July 2000 I was back in the Pillar Room of the Town Hall, Cheltenham to see a band called STACKRIDGE. Whilst I did not know any of their material I wanted to see this band as they pulled out of supporting WISHBONE ASH on 6th June 1999.

When we arrived we were told that there would be a support act which was two young lads performing well known tracks like "Three Times A Lady", "Celebration", instrumental versions of "Roll Over Beethoven", and "Sultans of Swing" all of which they performed to backing tapes, plus "Tears In Heaven", and an excellent acoustic version of "Big Love".

After the interval it was time for STACKRIDGE to take the stage. It is very hard to discribe the type of music this six piece band play except that it is good music with excellent musicianship. The two people I would pick out as being exceptional and different are, MIKE EVANS on Violin, and RICHARD STUBBINGS on Keyboards, Flute, Accordion and Guitar. Others in the band include CRUN WALTER on Bass, TIM ROBINSON on Drums, a smartly dressed IAN TOWERS on Keyboards, and JAMES WARREN (who was part of THE KORGIES in the late 70's) on Lead Guitar.

The band played songs from throughout their career and many songs from their latest album which is called "Something For The Weekend", songs like "Ruth, Did You Read My Mind?", "Help Under Doors", "The Youth Of Today", "Grooving Along On The Highway On A Monday Morning Once", and the superb "Something About The Beatles" which led into one of the Beatles own tracks "Old Brown Shoe". During the performance MIKE left the stage for some reason and so RICHARD and JAMES performed an excellent version of "Everybody's Got To Learn Sometimes". To close the show they performed THE BEACH BOYS hit "Help Me Rhonda", and got the audience (which was less than 100) to join in.

I really enjoyed this band and to find out more about them visit their website by clicking on the logo below where you can also purchase related merchandise.