99/2000

Giving Up The Ghost

This was to be the second single from the album Red, and you know how Carol has a habit of 'taking your breath away' with a beautiful ballad, well here, definitely is one of those moments!!

Here is the video I have made to it. A lovely picture of Carol as featured on the CD cover.

2000

Brannigans Tour 2000

T'Pau were back in business in February and March of 2000. They decided to do a tour of the 'theme-pubs' Brannigans.

Here are the full tour dates :

09/02/2000 Brannigans Reading
10/02/2000 Brannigans Crawley
16/02/2000 Brannigans Stoke
17/02/2000 Brannigans Chester
23/02/2000 Brannigans Derby
24/02/2000 Brannigans Leeds
01/03/2000 Brannigans Romford
02/03/2000 Brannigans Sheffield
07/03/2000 Brannigans Croydon
08/03/2000 Brannigans Ipswich
09/03/2000 Brannigans Manchester
15/03/2000 Brannigans Luton
16/03/2000 Brannigans Birmingham
22/03/2000 Brannigans Dundee
23/03/2000 Brannigans Edinburgh

Some of the shows were to be recorded for a future 'Greatest Hits Live' project!!

I went to two or three of the Brannigans gigs and I loved the venues. Each one I went to was 'full' and each one had a great atmosphere. One thing Carol does best is grabbing the attention of the audience.

This is the set listing of the gigs : (70 Minutes)

Island
Monkey House
With A Little Luck
Heart and Soul
Valentine
I Will Be With You
Bridge of Spies
The Promise
Say You Will
Let It All Fall
Wing and A Prayer
Secret Garden
Running Away
Sex Talk
Whenever You Need Me
Encore : China In Your Hand

The Following is a review of the first gig at Reading on 9th February which I have come across on-line.

T'Pau, live and direct at Brannigans.

"This was the first time I'd been in a Brannigans, never mind seen a band there. Brannigans is a chain of 'theme-pubs' scattered the length and breadth of Britain, which seem to be bringing music to the masses. The Brannigans slogan is 'eating, dancing and cavorting' - strange that it fails to mention live music as there seems to be live bands provided several nights a week. Most of them are , as seems to be the norm these days, cover bands, so tonight we were fortunate to see an original band perform, T'Pau. Despite this being a bar/nite-club, there is a proper stage area, raised 3 steps above the dance-floor, allowing everyone a chance to actually see the petite but still lovely, Carol.
This is not the T'Pau of the late 80's or early 90's though, only Carol Decker remains from those halcyon days. The other band members are a much younger, fresher set of musicians; Jez on Guitar, Dan on Drums, Dave on Bass and Jen (?) on Keyboards.
They performed with plenty of energy.

After a big introduction from the house DJ, the band appeared on stage, donned their instruments and led us into the first track, Island. Carol entered after the instrumental introduction to a large cheer, with noticeably longer hair than on the promo flyers scattered freely around the premises.

Island segued seamlessly into the following track, Monkey House, so it wasn't until after that that Carol said hello to the keen and loudly cheering Reading audience between chews on her gum! Only a few words, mind, and then the band sped into With A Little Luck. During this track, Jez and Dave gave us their Status Quo impression, legs astride and swinging guitar and bass forwards and back, just to prove that they are a rock 'n' roll band. Heart and Soul slowed the pace a little while whilst Valentine took it down another notch.

Speeding things up again, the next track, I Will Be With You , really showed the power of Carol's voice. She's certainly not lost any of her vocal ability over the years since T'Pau's first hits, hitting all the high notes and sustaining the lengthy ones.

Before Bridge of Spies, the title track of T'Pau's debut album, a brief pause allowed Carol to make a show of smelling her right armpit, commenting "It's hot up here!!". It was fairly warm in the audience too by this point, people crowding close to the stage to soak up the music. The third album's title track followed directly, The Promise. Things were rocked up a little by the next number, Say You Will, with Carol even headbanging before beginning the vocals!! The heavier tracks continued with Let It All Fall and Wing And A Prayer, Carol asking the band "Shall we get these people bopping again?" With "Let's get these people dancing!", the crowd were pleased to oblige.

Before Secret Garden, Carol asked us "How's my hair? I spent hours on it." followed by "You know how it is girls, you spend hours putting your make-up on, and ten minutes later it's running down your face!!"

During the rocky Running Away, as for the rest of the show, both bass and guitarist have large smiles on their faces, obviously enjoying themselves

Sex Talk followed with some phallic symbolisation care of the bass and guitar-the guys kneeling down, stage front, guitar necks raised between horizontal to almost vertical during the second chorus. They finished with Whenever You Need Me.

Before the last track, Carol introduced us to her band. The set & encore was brought to a close with T'Pau's most famous single, China In Your Hand, introduced by Carol as "Everyone in the %&£*+$" country knows this one." This seemed to be proved as most of the audience sang heartily along to the whole track."