The Manfreds: Hitting The Blues In Ilkley

Anyone expecting to hear all the big hits from the nineteen sixties when The Manfreds ruled the charts might have been surprised when the band graced the stage at the Kings Hall in Ilkley as part of their current UK tour.

The group led by the ever youthful Paul Jones displayed a kaleidoscope of musical styles that embraced jazz, pop, and mostly the blues; their sixties recordings seemed to pale in comparison to the blues-infused tracks that proved that the band were fans of the genre that might have previously been so obvious.

The musicianship on display was exemplary, with the sheer joy of coming together to play the music that they like being infectious and genuine.

When you have played the big hits as many times as The Manfreds have, no one could argue that some of the new arrangements of the tracks worked better when given a new workover. High Times was reborn as a jazzy romp, and I’ve Been A Bad Bad Boy became a blues-infested delight.

As Jones attested, he and the rest of the band “didn’t idolise their blues heroes; instead, they looked up to them.”

Any band that can go from playing the jazz funk of The Crusaders' Put It Where You Want It to the blues of Driver Man to the pop of Do Wah Diddy Diddy deserves recognition.

Tom McGuiness, formerly of McGuiness Flint, is now back in The Manfreds, so the rendition of When I'm Dead and Gone seemed natural. Dedicating the track to the recently deceased Herbie Flowers, the song was denied the Number One slot due to the Clive Dunn hit, Grandad, which was written by Flowers, the session musician who famously played the bass on Lou Reed's Walk on the Wild Side.

As the night came to a close, a group of world-class musicians took the audience on a musical journey through the Manfreds catalogue with Quinn The Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn), delivering it with style and substance.