Six bands were on the programme for this mini-festival held at the Shoppingtown Hotel in Doncaster. We’d gone to see Spectrum & the Kevin Borich Express. None of us had heard of the other bands scheduled to play. The first band I heard were Little House Godz. They were enthusiastic in their delivery but due to major problems with the PA & the way the sound was mixed I can’t tell you the names of any songs they sang or anything they said introducing these songs.  What came over was just a wall of loud indistinct noise.

Kings of Oz (labelled an Oz rock tribute band) were next.  Their lead singer was striking & had a great voice & even though the song titles were obvious the sound was mostly a loud, murky blur. Their delivery of the great Australian anthem Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again was destroyed due to the appalling sound mix. The crowd tried to provide the required responses but hearing the moments in the lyrics when we needed to come in was almost impossible.

None of the above issues filled me with much hope of hearing Spectrum where the ability to hear the lyrics is critical. In the early days of this band audiences sat on the floor to listen. On Saturday night the start of their set was as bad as I feared it would be due to problems with the PA & the sound mix but this improved somewhat so we could hear what Mike Rudd said & most of the lyrics.

MIKE RUDD ENDS A SONG WITH A FLOURISH WITH BRENDEN MASON ON THE LEFT & DRUMMER ROBBO ROBERTSON BEHIND.

Kevin Borich Express gave a strong performance & for reasons that I can’t explain we could hear his lyrics. It’s a year since we’ve last him with this line-up of the trio. They jell brilliantly & their set (of lesser known songs then crowd favourites & hits) ended way too soon.

And no; we did not stay round to hear the last band!

KEVIN BORICH, JON CARSON & CHRIS GILBERT