Lifeline Niter - Review 1st one- John Pugh

As may know the soul talk list is a email discussion soul list,.

One of the regular and main posters on the list is John Pugh from West Midlands way.

Has given ok to post one of his recent posts below. A review of the recent Lifeline event, thought be worthwhile as it gives others chance to read it.

Bit late I know, its been in the queue for a bit, but as next one coming up soon and have a couple more of Johns writings to pass on, it nudged me to get it out

Despite the travelling making me really rough for the last 3 days ( and probably at least the next 3 as well ) I wouldnt have missed Saturday for the world. Its kinda hard to top the Right music, the Right venue, the Right people in attendance and run by the Right people, etc., but Im sure they wont rest on their laurels and that itll go from strength to strength.

Speaking to one or two who dont get as far south as even Manchester very often, I think theyll really get the benefit of having interesting guests like Marco & the forthcoming Steve G. One comment I read said "1000 pound rarity after 1000 pound rarity", and of course thats the basis of the rare soul experience, but for me I thought the 4 Tops** track was an absolute master stroke (as well as some of the other well thought out, superb but relatively available tracks, and forgotten oldies) I know this might seem at odds with some folks ideas, but the way I look at it is that youve got to have some punctuation, otherwise some of the less well known ( but brilliant) tracks can sort of blend into one another and they can lose their impact. " You gotta have a slice of plain bread every so often to appreciate how wonderfull cake is" was how one person described it and thats how I see it too. If one punter can go home and dig out some cheap but wonderful track and give it another listen then thats another type of success to judge the night by. After all most of us can never hope to own a copy of lots of the tracks that will get aired, so its nice to have a few dotted throughout the night that you can go out and track down without paying a kings ransom. I think thats why I enjoy Andy Ds sets so much because he generally digs something out that fits into this category (Ive probably played Laws of Love at home more times in the last few months than I have in the last twenty years, purely because id heard and enjoyed hearing Andy play it in his set)

Having said that the main thrust of the nite for those who werent there, was wondrous obscure soul that downright deserves to be heard, because its just too good to be kept as a hidden gem.

At one point in the nite Max and I sat and listened to Butchs set and just melted !!!

He had two runs, think the one was five records and the other four, where it was as close to soul music perfection as you can get. Each tune just flowed perfectly into the next and its virtually impossible to put into words the feeling they generated, the emotional experience, the sheer joy of it, in my very humble opinion it was Northern Nirvana.

Id have gone if it had just have been Butch and Andy on their own, but I understand that other folk have their favourite djs too, and the other djs on the line up all bought something to the dance as it were. The idea of piping the music through is a winner for the old farts like me and watching folk dash off in the middle of a conversation reminded me of myself in happier times. You know how it goes, the opening bars hit you, the drink goes on the table, fag in the ashtray, quick mumbled appology to whoever you were talking to as you zip off, literally dragged onto the floor by the time the first word of the song comes in :-)

Often tho at most run of the mill doos you can tell when the djs change without looking by the music, but with this piped through idea, and the high quality maintained by ALL the djs it had me scratching my head at times wondering who was on. Thinking about it now, that makes me realise just how good all the sets I heard were.

Finally it was great that so many true rare soul fans had made their way from all points of the compass. It makes such a difference to be able to enjoy the company of those who share a similar interpretation of this music of ours. With so many venues going on all around the country hopefully this will become the one place that every rare soul fan decides to make the effort to support ( tho I dont think many more folk could have been fitted in ?)

Congrats Andy & Co, more power to ya !!!

cheers

john p.s. the ** above was to remind me to ask has anybody heard how Levi Stubbs is doing ? Last I read said he was very seriously ill, anybody heard different ?

thanks to John for the ok to use, soul talk email list can be found at http://www.smartgroups.com/soultalk