It seems right that upon seeing my blog is receiving no less than 50 new individual visitors per day on my A’s articles that it makes sense to offer up some additional reading material, being that I’ve attended the A’s reunion concert. It’s a long time since 1978 when I was in the eighth grade and the A’s first took flight from the northern side of Philadelphia. See my previous articles with comments and replies from actual band members: The Philadelphia band The A's, by the time I was in nineth grade in 1979 their self titled debut album was all over the region and they were the darlings of WMMR and WYSP the two dominant rock radio stations in the area.
The A’s re-united for the first time in 22 years at the Electric Factory on Thanksgiving Eve November 22nd. Mike Snyder on Drums, Terry Bortman on Bass, Rocco Notte on Keys, Rick DeFonzo on lead guitar and frontman Richard Bush. I attended as one of the younger fans. I was 14 years old when the A’s were the Philadelphia Regions pride. They played the Philly club scene and Delaware was just as much a part of it hitting clubs like the Stone Balloon in Newark Delaware.
DATING MYSELF
Now after 22 years they re-unite at the Electric Factory an long time venue for area bands. We stood in a line around the block to get in at 7:00 pm after first doing some window shopping down South Street and grabbing a cheese steak at Jim’s. I couldn’t help but notice the age group in attendance. It was obvious to me that the A’s were now an older band which really struck me as strange. They were always an older band to me as when I was 14, I couldn’t even get into a concert, but I’ll get to that. My date is considerably younger than me and she and I had to laugh at her feeling like a spring chicken at a concert while we were adults. I didn't dare mention the Hooters or Robert Hazard to her.
THE ELECTRIC FACTORY
The Electric Factory is an old warehouse that is essentially standing room only, but they do have a back balcony of sorts where four makeshift VIP lounges can be seen from floor level. That same balcony level wraps around stage left with bar stools lining the edge in the shape on an “L”. To the back side is the bar. The building is small enough that no seat in the house is bad but I we arrived early enough to place ourselves only 15 feet from the stage. I took a lot of photos. Before the gig started I did something I never do, I bought a T-shirt, after all this was the A’s. They had buttons on sale for $3.00 but I just couldn’t bring myself to dropping $3.00 on tiny piece of metal I’d only wear for the night. When I left later I saw both jars still full. I wanted one, but $3.00 seemed just plain wrong. LOL Loved that Logo though!
BEFORE THE CONCERT
Once again I couldn’t help but notice before the concert that everyone was pushing 50 years old. The real benefit of this was the decency of the audience. This was nothing like the John Mayer Concert at the Tweeter where no matter how you marked off your plot of grass with your blanket, you were destined to be kicked, stepped on and your blanket walked across by utterly rude and oblivious twenty-somethings. I have to say this, I never witnessed a more self-absorbed crowd. I recall my date and I literally turning around to a group of girls no less than three times during that concert and scolding them like a parent. And each time they espoused how sorry they were for tramping or colliding into us and each time they did it again as if we never spoke to them the first time. So here, where everyone could have jammed up on each other, everyone gave each other space to stand and even dance in place. Just before the concert, Perrie Robert of WMMR MC’d an intro with sincere enthusiasm and introduced each member on stage. Oh the grey hairs! Rocco had a full head of grey ing hair, Richard was fully gray and for some reason still had his same do in years past which looked rather unkempt and frizzy. But he still had that wild happy enthusiasm and he wore his trademark sock-hop bowling shoes in white and black. Rick Defonzo whom was tall and lanky is now a stout figure and clearly matured into a father like figure. The drummer Mike Snyder looked happy to be a part of something special and he too looked like the years had treated him kindly. Their basses Terry Boardman had a distinct feel of Trevor Horn with his glasses and reverence. On a whole the band looked like they didn’t destroy themselves over the years and that was something I just couldn’t help but notice. You never want to be let down by your heroes. And believe me to see the Hooters walk out on stage later, I had the feeling the A’s despite having lived in the shadow of the Hooters, were better off in life.
THE CONCERT
So now we get to it. The first song! They play the first open cords to Words and stop. Richard turns to the guys and says, “Can you believe this?” in retrospective pride. Then wham! I video recorded this first song.
Now as the night wore on I was glad to hear songs I was familiar with, Painting by Numbers, Do the Dance, I Pretend She’s You, Electricity, A Woman’s Got the Power and of course After Last Night. But as they played each song I was becoming a bit concerned. I could not hear Rocco’s keyboards on songs where he had a featured part such as Painting By Numbers. His keys were just plain lost and when he should have been front, they were hardly discernable let alone be heard. It was sad. I caught on to this early on when they played I Pretend She’s You but after that it was apparent the sound for the A’s tonight was not going to be good. This should have bothered me more because Rocco's keyboard work is accented and or featured to perfection throughout many songs. His instrument is a primary element in A's songs and to be deprived of it was noticable.
This was hard for me. Finally after 25 years of listening to the A’s was at a live gig and I wasn’t about to walk away dissatisfied but as a true fan of this band, I knew every song, and I knew who who’s part took front and center in every song. I could tell that things were not right. The sound was muddy for one, from my vantage of 20 feet from stage there was way too much distortion. Not just distortion, way too much. In contrast when the Hooters came out, it was crisp and clean. It was loud, but clear. And that really iced it for me. I felt like the A’s were most likely back stage after the gig feeling frustrated by a night that was meant to be a blast from the past and an opportunity to bask in the appreciation of dedicated fans. I sensed that Rick was dealing with the most frustration from a bad guitar cable which both cut out during their Secret Agent Man encore and suffered some other inconveniences earlier in the gig. On a whole I as a fan didn’t let any of it get me down, what bothered me was that my date didn’t have the benchmark of past knowledge on how these song’s really sounded, so what she experienced could never have been appreciated like someone that knew the songs prior.
I could see on Rick’s face a number of times suppressing discontent expressing the dignified, “The show must go on” attitude when his sound was screwed up. I have to wonder if he really gave people a piece of his mind backstage though. The good news in all of this is that the A’s have one more gig and I’ll bet the farm they don’t have the same problems as I’m sure if the expression on Rick’s face was true, he wouldn’t stand for it. Thinking back on the night, I have to wonder if Rick is the guy all of them had to convince to do this concert in the first place, when I was in a band we all had one temperamental member, and I’m sure every band has the one guy that needs things to be just right. After the issues with sound, I’ve been thinking if the sound isn’t g better for Friday, he would certainly not want to do another re-union concert.
While all this was going on, I just danced and sang along. When The A’s began with Neil Diamond’s Daydream Believer I was quick to my date this was a ruse. They don’t play this whole song, its part of a ruse. Sure enough after breaking into the chorus Richard did his thing and the band stopped in stride and broke into Misunderstanding, to which I got a big kick out of. I noticed that not as many people in the audience understood this as I had expected. But in the end, I was just loving that song. It is a great contemporary display of modern love. Better yet, it’s a great dance tune best heard live, “She said give me a kiss, I said YOU GIVE ME A KISS!, Misunderstanding again and again…” Ha!
