Saturday, February 11, 2006


Brother Patrick caught The Fleshtones in Évreux, France on 10th February 2006

"Last night, The Fleshtones played in Évreux as part of their European 30th anniversary tour. Opening act was The Neurotic Swingers, a French combo who seem to have success elsewhere, like in Japan and Spain. Maybe for us Frenchies, they sound too much like The Dogs – that's The (French) Dogs, who released “19”, the best 1977 punk song ever (no, it’s not the Users “Sick Of You” and if you don’t agree, well, you're wrong). By the way, The Swingers covered “19” at the end of their set. Another connection with The Dogs is that the Fleshtones latest record is a 10” titled “Allo Brooklyn, Ici montmartre”, sung in French by Tony Truant & the Fleshtones. Tony was a member of the Dogs Mk. 2, the line up that recorded “Too Much Class For The Neighbourhood”, an album for all Flamin’ Groovies fans circa “Shake Some Action”, “Now” and “Jumpin’ In The Night”.

The Fleshtones are older but are still like teenagers. Happy to be on stage and their enthusiasm is infectious. They are true entertainers and no one in the audience can stay static, Peter Zaremba and Keith Streng left the stage often to bait the crowd. During “Push Up Man”, 3 guys were enrolled to play and sing while the band were doing their exercises. I declined the invitation because I was recording the show which ended with a long encore that featured many old favourites including “Girl From Baltimore"

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Fact fiends should note that the Troggs tune cited halfway down the set list is "Feels Like a Woman". The original can be found on a Freakbeat CD compilation put out by Sequel a few years back.