Boom Boom Club Review
Thanks to sw5's John

It was terrific ... full review may follow when I have time,

Mick was playing as part of a 12-piece band to launch Andy Sharrocks'
debut album 'Walking In Familiar Footsteps', which has Mick playing on
four songs and gives him joint writing credits on two. I'm fairly sure
he was on stage for the whole concert, although I found myself just
enjoying the whole thing rather than concentrating on Mick particularly.
He played rhythm/filler on some tracks but had substantial lead breaks
on quite a few, certainly not just his parts from the album.

The Boom Boom Club is a smallish venue which is part of the Sutton
United Football Club complex. It's like a typical small village hall,
and the low stage looked very crowded with all the musicians packed onto
it ... Mick himself was hidden behind the backing singers for much of
the time. But it all made it seem very friendly and intimate and there
was a great buzz coming from the stage, with lots of interaction between
the musicians.  Andy himself has great presence and timing on stage and
is a natural singer and focal point. 

The album, which I didn't hear until afterwards, is varied in pace and
playing it live I'm fairly sure they extended some of the livelier
numbers to keep the mood going.  The rhythm section were excellent,
especially the great, driving, almost funky bass from one of the Vee
brothers. Hilly Briggs' melodic keyboard playing also added a lot to the
great feel of the music, which was worthy of a better venue and a bigger
crowd ... there can't have been more than 150 people there. 

The band consisted of Andy Sharrocks on vocals and guitar, Mick Taylor
and Paul Green on guitar, two of the Vee brothers on bass and drums
respectively, someone on bongos/percussion, Hilly Briggs and Chris
Parren on keyboards, someone standing in on harmonica and whose name was
mentioned a hundred times but I still forgot, and three girls who did a
great job on backing vocals.

Most of the tracks from the album came across really well and were
distinctive enough from the first hearing that I was able to instantly
recognise them when I listened to the CD. My favourite was "Salvation In
Disguise", which is also one of Mick's songs ... and the feel of this
song was echoed through the concert more than you would think by
listening to the album, which is possibly a little heavy on Andy's
gravelly vocals for my taste.

The clear highlight, though, was the encore, a long version of You Can't
Always Get What You Want which was close in feel to the 1973 versions
and really brought a tear to my eye ... Andy's voice was perfect for
this song. I think Mick played at least two separate breaks, but I was
just enjoying the whole feel of the song and the great atmosphere.  Andy
seemed genuinely surprised and pleased by the very warm reception from
the crowd, especially when the band came back on for the encore. I
thought Mick looked quite moved at the end too.

The only other MT-related songs were a great No Expectations and a
rendition of Losing My Faith which didn't work that well for me and
seemed to break the mood a bit. In another song, Mick played what seemed
to be a whimsical break which was very untypical, with a lot of low,
smooth notes in it (I don't know how else to describe it ... I thought
of it as being typical of Ry Cooder, but then I don't actually know much
of his stuff so that could be very misleading).

All in all a great evening with a stupendous climax, made all the better
for me by the fact that I had really just dropped in on the off-chance
on the way home from work :-)

John