As one fan said, “Whatever John Mayall does, he will always be the leader of the blues”. Others who have since become R&B legends themselves gravitated towards Mayalls Bluesbreakers. The likes of Mick Fleetwood, Anysley Dunbar, John McVie, Mick Taylor, Hugie Flint, Eric Clapton and a host of others. This was in the early days of the Yardbirds and the Rolling Stones. The days when Mayall was considered the more “serious” musician. Well, it’s 40 years later and this incredible entertainer is still churning it out at a pace that would cripple most younger players.
The band are first out on stage. Buddy Whittington, the Texas fast gun on guitar, kicks the band into the first song without Mayall. Young punters in the crowd, who have not seen Mayall before would be par-doned for thinking they were already watching John Mayall and the Blues Breakers. A couple of songs pass and then Buddy announces that they would now like to introduce the “Boss” to the stage. Out comes John Mayall. Frenetically energetic especially for a man of his age. The music is in your face blues and Mayall is right there with it. Whether blowing harmonica, playing guitar or trashing ivories, John Mayall unleashes himself like an over-wound watch spring. He is surrounded by Nexo PS15 stage monitors and finds it very easy to move from position to position anywhere on the stage without any change in sound. The monitoring is fantastic and only helps to enhance an already super charged performance. To a lot of younger blues fans this must have been a real eye opener.
Brett Galvin (Tiny) doing front of house yet again for Tony Joe White – “Fortunately on this show they have given me Nexo’s. The Nexo’s are very good. Very controllable. You can drive the hell out of them and they just take it. No real problem with FOH sound bleeding back on stage either. I’m very pleased with them”.
Badloves frontman Michael Spiby generally pays a lot of attention to the soundcheck and especially the on stage monitors. On this occasion there were a few disruptions and the band was rushed onstage without preparation. “A bit worrying” said Michael “because I am normally very critical of the monitors”. But part way into the first song, it suddenly dawned on me. Without doing or changing anything, they were fantastic. I could not have improved on them at all. Nexo strikes again.”
