Commodores @ St James Theatre, Wellington
Sequins, slow grooves and a Komodo dive trip theme song, live at the St James.
The reason I went to see the Commodores was one song: Easy. It became the theme song of our Komodo dive trip. We had a rough dive at Police Corner in Batu Balong, a well known difficult spot, and for all the dives after that people were a little more nervous. To calm down we'd sing Easy while queuing up to stride in from the boat. Funny how a song can come to resonate.
You have to take your lady to see a Commodores show, so it was date night with Jo, and our first time seeing them. We were in the cheapest seats in the house, all the way up the back, which may explain the slightly more feral than usual vibe. The crowd was a little faded bogan, but mostly everybody was there to get down.
This was an old school funk and soul show, from the matching sequins on their jumpsuits to the classic 70s slow groove croony hits. The band were professional, well tuned, consummate entertainers. Some of them weren't senior citizens, but more were, and one or two were in the original band. I have to admit I don't really know who is who in the Commodores, other than Lionel Richie, who definitely wasn't in the brick house of the St James tonight.
The musicians who were there pushed out the hits one after another, classic tunes done well. I got my Easy, and they also played Nightshift and Three Times A Lady, absolute classics that melt your heart every time you hear them. They did the synchronised strut across the stage, they did the bass solo bit, and they told stories about Kenny Rogers, who helped discover them back in the day. Then, fittingly, they closed with Brick House.
It was groovy as, and we had a great night out. Bravo.
Photos from the gig
