Feb. 8, 1975 review: Orleans and Hall & Oates at UB's Clark Gym

 

If you wanted to catch rising stars in the 1970s, there was a good chance they would be playing a nearby college, e.g., the legendary Bruce Springsteen date at Niagara University in March 1973. This UB show on a snowy evening brought us a couple regional artists that were on the verge of much bigger things. 

Feb. 8, 1975 

Hall & Oates, Orleans Victims

Of Another Energy Shortage? 

          It isn’t a fit night out for man or beast Friday, but here some 1,200 UB kids have plowed through the blowing, snowing misery anyway to the heavy warmth of Clark Gym.

          They’re out to catch a wholesome foursome from Woodstock called Orleans. Me, I’m sliding in for the opening act – Daryl Hall & John Oates.

          What with my laggardliness and the UUAB Music Committee’s promptness this year, I arrive to find the two former Philadelphia folkies and their new rock band already in progress, bouncing to the insistent fantasy of “Beanie G and the Rose Tattoo” off their “War Babies” album.

* * *

HALL STANDS tall and blond at the keyboards, dressed in shiny, skin-tight black, losing himself in the singing. Oates, a curly-aired Spanish bandit in white satin, vamps guitar with the bounding bassist.

          An East Coast popstar vision of Loggins & Messina. Must be their association with Todd Rundgren that’s done it, along with their abiding songwriting feel for hard-edge melancholy and tender neuroses.

          The old folk harmonies show through in places, but not quite enough. Happily, however, they still do “She’s Gone” as if the Tavares never made a hit out of it.

* * *

THEY PLAY hot – pumping syncopations and dark sonorous ballads into the laidback audience, trying a little too hard to get them to their feet. But the energy’s all absorbed. It doesn’t bounce back.

          After the tapes of the Eagles and Jackson Browne during intermission, Orleans doesn’t require much of an adjustment. It’s a comfortable, countryish rock band.

          The four of them trade off instruments and vocals, harmonize pleasantly and occasionally hit a double guitar section that’ll remind you of the Allman Brothers.

* * *

BUT DESPITE the cheers at the beginning of their nearly two hours on stage, they can’t get the crowd up and dancing either.

          Their second encore, a tune of theirs Janis Joplin picked up called “Half Moon,” doesn’t even do it. Were the kids sobered by the thought of the chilly walk home, I wonder as I kick through the bottles on the way out. Or is it just another shortage of energy.

* * * * *

IN THE PHOTOS: A candid shot of Hall and Oates in 1974, Orleans publicity photo from 1975, the review on the page (note the ad for Rodan at McVan’s).

* * * * *

FOOTNOTE: I’d been a big fan of the Hall & Oates since “Abandoned Luncheonette,” their second album. Their follow-up, “War Babies,” produced by Todd Rundgren, was one of my Top 10 for 1974 and this was their tour to support it. They were still an opening act in those days and this show isn’t even mentioned in several of their tour histories. The big push came later in February, when they did four nights at the Bottom Line in New York City with Leo Sayer.

          Here’s the song list from their Feb. 4 date at the Roxy Theatre in Northampton, Mass., a mix of stuff from their second and third albums, courtesy of setlist.fm. 

Can’t Stop the Music (He Played It Much Too Long)

Beanie G. and the Rose Tattoo

You’re Much Too Soon

Better Watch Your Back

When the Morning Comes

Laughing Boy

I’m Just a Kid (Don’t Make Me Feel Like a Man)

Abandoned Luncheonette

She’s Gone

Lady Rain

Born Too Late

Rock and Roll (I Don’t Wanna Play)

Is It a Star 

          Woodstock-based Orleans was similarly struggling. According to Wikipedia, their record label refused to do an American release of their second album, “Orleans II,” in 1974 because they didn’t hear a hit on it, even though it contains the first version of one of their biggest hits, “Dance With Me.”

          By time they played Clark Gym, they had been signed to a new label, Asylum, and the arrival of their third album, “Let There Be Music,” was a month away. It included a new version of “Dance With Me” and it went to No. 6 on the pop charts. Their biggest hit, the infectious “Still The One,” didn’t arrive until 1976. It’s been heard in commercials and movie soundtracks ever since.

          Setlist.fm has only a partial list of songs from the Clark Gym date – just “If I Don’t Have You,” “Please Be There” and “Dance With Me.” A better glimpse of what they were playing in those days is this set from the Orpheum Theatre in Boston on March 28, 1975: 

Trench Town Rock

Cold Spell

Ending of a Song

Mountain

Please Be There

Dance With Me

Two Faced World

If

Let There Be Music

Big Fat Mama

Half Moon

One Sided Love

Tongue-Tied 

          An entire show at the Jabberwocky, a basement club at Syracuse University, was videotaped by students in 1974 and contains several of the same songs. It can be seen here: https://www.orleansonline.com/blog/2020/10/Live-at-The-Jabberwocky-1974.