Great to see Kevin back in Melbourne again after more than a year. And of the gigs I have seen him deliver in Melbourne over the last few year, it was one of the best. This time, instead of his regular band he had fellow Kiwi Roger McLachlan on bass & the legendary Gil Matthews on drums. I’d last last Roger play with Stars but not recently & I had never seen Gil play before.

Early in the first set, Kevin gave us some of his newer songs, including ‘Straight From My Heart’ which he does on his new ‘Duets’ album with Ian Moss & ‘Call A Friend’; the song from the ‘Duets’ album that he does with Russell Morris. In the second set we heard some of the songs we expect like “Heartstarter’, ‘Soapbox Bitching Blues’ & ‘Tango Queen’.

And he sang ‘Little Red Rooster’ … I can’t recall him singing that recently but it did remind me of the day I saw him play in the hot midday sun in September 2015 at the Towers Rocks Festival, just out of Charters Towers in FNQ. He remembered that day too. When we chatted before he began & we were talking about the interviews I’d done with him for the NZ Musicians in Oz book (due out soon) he recalled the first I did with him at that festival site through a 10 foot high security fence. He couldn’t get out of the stage area & I couldn’t get in. And of all the interviews I did for the book it was by far the weirdest!