The last of the four, what I loosely describe as “gigs”, 10cc’s Graham Gouldman performed his heart full of songs in acoustic fashion at the Snape Proms last night. With accompaniment from Mike Stevens and Iain Hornal, with percussion contributions from Dave Cobby.
As he wrote his first hit in 1964, He had around 50 years of material to choose from, so it was hardly surprising that the material was extensively first rate – if I had to make a judgement, I would argue that Graham’s contributions to the 10cc canon was at the poppier end of the market and his previous career as a songwriter for hire probably provided the groundwork for the group hits that followed. We had everything from ‘Bus Stop’ to ‘I’m Not in Love’, from ‘For Your Love’ to ‘Good Morning Judge’, along with a smattering of his more recent material; clearly, some of the material defied acoustic reinterpretation and so wasn’t included, but by and large the set Graham had created was almost universally successful. A songwriter in the old sense, initially a man for hire who went on to form part of one of the most innovative bands of the 70s, it was good to know that he has recently been added to the songwriter hall of fame. Much underappreciated, it was good to hear he was being justifiably recognised and appreciated as a man of considerable talent. But no encore – surely some mistake!!