Back to Liverpool’s Camp n Furnace venue in the Baltic Quarter last night (Friday 21st October 2022) to see a group called The Classic Double Band. They were billed as performing the complete albums of Ok Computer from Radiohead and Dark Side of the Moon from Pink Floyd. An eclectic mixture of artists separated by generations. The show started at 9:30pm and after arriving, getting our wristbands and grabbing a drink we headed into the venue shortly before 9:30pm to find the usual layout of long Camp n Furnace tables removed for this event. It was more of an empty pit-style floor for dancing. There were some seats around the sides, but reserved seating on the right and public seating (which was mega full) on the left. So we found a supportive pillar and gave it some additional support.

Up front let me state again that anyone who can get up on a stage, play an instrument or sing has a lot more balls than I do. I wish I could get up and give it a go. So I have a lot of admiration for the musicians and unsung heroes who get up and play these shows. But the atmosphere was a little on the strange side at this gig. The band came onto the stage being played in by a recording of Fitter Happier from Radiohead’s OK Computer album, which is fair enough, not exactly a song that can be played live really (It’s a spoken word ‘song’ with some heavy voice modulation), and the group turned themselves in before launching into a decent cover of Airbag. The crowd seemed to like it and they had some decent applause by the end of it.

The audience was fairly static, considering the room available with the removal of the seating, most people just continuing to chat away as the group played almost in the background. Following Airbag they paused for a tune up and then played My Iron Lung! – Great Radiohead song.. from The Bends album.. doesn’t feature on OK Computer however… Neither does Fake Plastic Trees which they played a little later on. From then onwards they flicked between playing tracks from OK Computer such as Karma Police, No Surprises, Electioneering, Paranoid Android and Exit Music (for a film), and some more tracks from The Bends and Creep from Pablo Honey. They finished their set with Weird Fishes which is a fantastic song and the music that they were playing was tight.. But it just wasn’t what was billed. – If they’d have played the OK Computer album in full then added on to the end some crowd pleasers and classics, then that’d probably have worked out better.

The lead singer wasn’t the most crowd engaging singer ever, talking to one or two people who he seemed to know and largely seeming to ignore or simply mis-read the general mood of the audience. Their set list seemed rigidly pre-decided rather than playing to the reaction of the crowd. But they finished their set and off they went.

In the break we got another drink and took a seat next door while waiting to see what was going to happen next. I am sure that we weren’t the only ones confused, as many people left at that point – Even the sound engineer didn’t have a clue as to what was happening next.

About 20 minutes later, the musicians returned to the stage – the same who’d just played the Radiohead set, together with an extra backing singer, a saxophonist and an additional keyboardist. A new lead singer appeared and the band launched into Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon with gousto. Now they played the entire album, in sequence and the music simply flowed. From one song to the next. The very nature of Floyd allows this to be the case anyway, but then Radiohead’s OK Computer flows like that too – If played in order.

Anyway, you could see that it was Pink Floyd that they were really passionate about playing. The sound engineers found level 11 during what was seemingly the ‘headline’ set of the night as you could really feel the energy and beats coming from the artists on stage. Music was played really tightly and without tuning breaks between songs, it really just flowed from one song to the next. The Floyd set was done in around 40 minutes – that was the entirety of the album, and then the band returned for an encore playing Comfortably Numb and another classic or two I am told. They received a good round of applause from the remaining audience at the end of the show and there seemed to be some debate between audience members as to if we would get a second encore or not.. Alas, we did not.

Overall it was a good night thanks to the company I had for this one, to have a chat (where appropriate, like not while the group are playing like some folks there), and share a couple of drinks. Should definitely be done more often. Classic Double Band.. I am not sure I would return to see again. They were good, but I’ve been to see three different Radiohead cover groups this year, and I would class them no higher than 3rd. But Camp n Furnace.. and Live Music.. Yep, I’ll be back soon!