Miscellaneous - Shepherd's Bush Empire, London, 15/6/2005

  by Anthony Strutt

published: 18 / 6 / 2005

intro

A massive act in the late 80's and early 90's, the La's recently reformed after a 13 year break. Long-term fan sees them at the Shepherd's Bush Empire and finds times barely changed

The La’s were a massive act of the late 80’s that I saw loads of times. I was at their first London show at the Cricketers in Kennington back in September ’87. I got a bit bored with them around ’91 or ‘92, when after five years their set remained the same apart from two new songs, one of which ‘ I am the Key’, which is still in their set tonight and still remains unrecorded. The band have now reformed and are currently recording a new album, but their eponymous first album was only released in 1990, because their label Go Discs got fed up with frontman Lee Mavers’ search for perfection and stuck it out without the band’s permission. The album came out out as a remaster in 2001 along with 5 extra tracks. The La’s come on stage very late at around 10 p.m, and play for 70 minutes which was a standard La’s length set. To be honest, apart from featuring a new drummer and a new guitarist, this gig could have been in any year from ‘87 onwards. It had sold out and was perfectly delivered and, while not offering anything that long-term fans would not have seen before, it was good to have them back. Let’s hope the new album appears sooner rather than later, but I doubt it. Set List : Son of a Gun Freedom Song Clean Prophet Come In, Come Out Way Out Doledrum There She Goes Timeless Melody I.O.U. Big Black Car Feeling Liberty Ship Calling All Failure Looking Glass Encores : New Song I am the Key New Song Knock Me Down

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