This past Saturday night Baroque Pop Icons The Zombies brought their Life Is A Merry-go Round tour to the historic Fonda Theater in the center of Hollywood and it was one of the more interesting concerts I have been to in several years. Please check out our full interview and photo gallery of the night below.

The crowd was not as packed as it should have been for a Saturday night slot with an iconic headliner, however that didn’t stop every concert goer from having a wonderful time. However, there were random spurts of arguments between a group of hipsters and other concert goers not being able to hear the show over the hipsters talking. This and more lead to the vibe in the room being a bit tense in moments. Once reunited local power pop act Rooney left the stage after their “unplugged” set (side note: making power pop acoustic really highlights The Beatles influence on the subgenre) people got another drink and put in the wait for The Zombies to be revealed behind the curtain.

The setlist for this tour is an odd one consisting of B-sides, songs from projects that aren't The Zombies but featured at least one of its members and then all of their classic album Odessey And Oracle mixed in with several but mostly informative stories of how some of these songs came together or how singer Colin Blunstone does not really know the lyrics to most of the B-sides they played and how when we sing along we should make them up as we go just like him.

What made this show great though are these amazing songs the band wrote in such a short period of time they were originally together and the incredible level of musicianship the band retains. Each member got their own moment in the spotlight to show off their skills and the highlight being the penultimate song being keyboardist/one of the band’s core songwriters Rod Ardent leading an almost 18 minute rendition of his post zombies band Ardent’s “Hold Your Head Up” (did you know the chorus is “hold your head up, woman” and not “hold your head up, woo”?) which over half of that time was taken up by Ardent’s insane organ solo. Leaving the show I felt incredibly happy to finally be seeing these legends live along with a bunch of funny little memories that i'll hold onto as long as I can.

Listen to The Zombies

Article & Photos by: Ben Lacross

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