SLADE AREA LIVE
SLADE / HAMMERSMITH ODEON, LONDON 16/5/1974
Groups are often either good on record or on stage, but only a few really great bands are fantastic on both --- SLADE is one of them.
When they took over the Hammersmith Odeon recently for a three day version of Slade's Crazee Nite we knew it was going to be something special, so out came the glitter hairdos and best gear and off we went for an evening of fun, with David to take the pictures.
To get things off to a lively start there was a Slade look -a- like contest, organised by compere GREG EDWARDS.
The winners were judged by a special clapometer, which gauged the amount of applause from the audience, and won cassette tape recorders for prizes.
The support band were BECKETT who play their own special brand of of fairly heavy sound, and although they were very good and really got everyone moving, they suffered the same setback that every support has to put up with -- the audience were only really waiting for one thing --- Slade live!
Then at last the waiting was over and the band came out. They broke into a non stop stream of the kind of terrific, lively, noisy music that makes them so great, all accompanied of course by typical Slade frolics and gestures.
The stage set was an extravaganza in itself, with twin staircases leading to a platform, festooned with lights, that JIMMY and DAVE rushed around on. Near the front there were three smaller stages set out into the audience so that NODDY could move forward practically within touching distance. The numbers were too numerous to list, but they included all the big favourites, more than half accompanied by the whole audience. The time seemed to pass like seconds but at the end of it all they'd more than lived up to their promise --Slade were their usual crazee selves and it was some special kind of nite.
GM / UNKNOWN PUBLICATION / MAY 1974