Head East at Fun Festival, New Richmond, WI (11 July 2015)

If you grew up in the Midwest in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s and listened to any classic rock radio, there’s never been any reason you haven’t heard of Head East.



The band has actually been around in some form since 1969, starting out in east central Illinois and made noticeable waves with their 1975 album, Flat as a Pancake and song ‘Never Been Any Reason’ and brought the current incarnation of the band to rock a tent full of people for New Richmond’s Fun Fest.

Strutter

Opening the evening was classic Kiss tribute band, Strutter, who brought their own blast-from-the-past nostalgia with an authentic in-makeup and costume performance of the original band from its classic Kiss Alive and Kiss Alive II eras.  All the classic ‘70s hits were performed with “Ace” posing during his solo, “Gene” splitting blood during ‘God of Thunder’, “Paul” going shirtless, and “Peter” stepping out from the drum kit to a front stool for ‘Beth’.



The band was ideal for an event like this, playing songs everyone knew and could drink and toast along to.  Of course, the last song was “Rock and Roll All Nite’ complete with everything from the original Kiss except the confetti cannons and pyro.

Head East: Darren Walker

As with most bands still going after over 40 years, Head East’s lineup has changed plenty, with founding keyboardist Roger Boyd being the mainstay of the quintet.  The rest of the group (Darren Walker – lead vocals; Glen Bridger – lead guitar, vocals; Greg Manahan – bass guitar, vocals; Eddy Jones – drums, vocals) sounded tight but were also clearly having fun during their 90 min. set.



Opening with ‘Raise a Little Hell’, a 1978 cover of Canadian band Trooper, then following with their own ‘Get Up and Enjoy Yourself’, the band clearly aimed to elevate the party spirit inside the music tent.  The only distracting thing was the large steel tent pole positioned right in the middle front of the stage, which looked awkward and made the drummers in each band, difficult to see unless you watched from an angle.



Playlist stayed mostly in the 70’s, working in over half of Flat as a Pancake (which was fine with me), but a few newer songs were slotted in as well. Singer Walker had good vocal range and brought a heavy metal edge to the blues rock band, moving constantly from one end of the stage to the other and even posing with fans mid-verse for selfies.



Guitarist Bridger shone on the new, ‘One Night’ while ‘Prisoner’ took its lyrical inspiration from Native American legends.   Another cover and radio standard from the era, 1977’s ‘Mama Let Him Play’ sounded fresh again with Walker’s vocals and Bridger’s soloing, so much so that most in the audience likely didn’t realize it wasn’t their song originally.

Setlist

Bass and drums got their time during ‘Jefftown Creek’ with a little ‘Peter Gunn Theme’ thrown in for good measure, and the Russ Ballard cover that followed sounded authentic as well.  “Is there one you really want to hear?” Walker asked as Boyd strapped a keyboard over his shoulder for the main set closer, ‘Never Been Any Reason’, which brought the strongest response of the night, and the Grand Funk Railroad cover to close the evening that followed, ended everything with an exclamation.



Head East continues to tour the Midwest and beyond, doing 30-40 dates a year and are well worth catching for anyone into blues-infused classic rock. or that grew up listening to the group’s ‘70s hits on midwest FM radio.

john (johnc@weheartmusic.com)
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