DREADZONE – CONCORDE 2 2.2.18
It’s a fact that Brighton and the Concorde 2 will always have fond memories for reggae-masters Dreadzone!
They appeared here last February (24th to be exact) and literally one hour before that show was due to start, Dreadzone posted on their Facebook page. “Dread Times has entered the UK Top 40 Official Album Charts at Number 39. Thank you so much to everyone who was involved in making this happen and to everyone who has supported us and bought a copy of the album. This is our first Top 40 album in over 20 years!”
Virtually one year later and the multicultural guys in Dreadzone are still plugging the virtues of that terrific album. Tonight’s line-up was only a five-piece instead of the usual six as guitarist Chris Compton wasn’t a well bunny. So on stage were vocalists MC Spee and Earl 16, Leo Williams on bass, Greg Dread on drums and Bazil on samples and technology.
Dreadzone have successfully spread their sound across several complimenting music genres during their impressive 25-year history. There was a pleasant mix of dub, reggae, ska, electronic rock and trip hop on offer here tonight in Brighton.
As per last year, the band opened with the first track called ‘Rootsman’, which appears on their eighth studio album ‘Dread Times’, which was recorded at one-time Clash and Big Audio Dynamite member Mick Jones’ Bunker Studio. This tune was swiftly followed by their uplifting ‘Life, Love And Unity’ 1996 single.
We were initially treated to eleven more compositions including two bouncy numbers from ‘Dread Times’, namely ‘Mountain’ (in my opinion the best track on the album) and ‘16 Hole’. Both of which were expertly performed and the excited Brighton crowd were jumping around and generally ‘aving it large.
This year like last year ‘Digital Mastermind’ was one of the standout songs of the night, however, I was miffed that my fave track from their 2017 Concorde 2 gig ‘Different Planets’ has been dropped.
Other singles given an outing tonight were – ‘Zion Youth’ (which seemed slower than I had remembered it), their famous Top 20 hit ‘Little Britain’ and as one of the two encore tracks, the anthemic and best track on the night ‘Captain Dread’ – Ahoy!
So there you have it. After a tight 90 minute set made up of 15 numbers they were gone. The sweat-soaked sold out crowd mainly headed to the merch stand to purchase some keepsakes of such an extraordinary evening. I know I did! Grabbed myself a Dreadzone hoodie for a mere £20. I would suggest that a fair number of large music artists should reflect on my £20 spent, whereby those artists that have been charging between £50 to £65 for their hoodies didn’t see a penny of my money!
It’s hats off yet again to the Concorde 2 for putting on such an excellent event. For more information on Dreadzone visit http://www.dreadzone.com/ and for more fun Concorde 2 gigs, visit here: https://www.concorde2.co.uk/events
Love this band ,about time they had a bigger venue in Brighton as it was rammed at the Concorde 2 last night
Yes it sure was rammed in there Tracy. Trouble is that if they were to play a bigger venue, you may loose quite a bit of the intimacy that we experience last night. Thank you for your comment.