The Zombies - Shepherd's Bush Empire

A COUPLE of minor mid-sixties hits and two albums should hardly add up to a career, yet the influence and quality of this band far outweighs the quantity of their output. The four surviving members reunited for the first time in 40 years to play their masterpiece, Odessey & Oracle, recorded at the same time as Sgt Pepper in 1967 but released after the group had split a year later.

The first half of the evening will not worry anyone stuck in traffic. A set of Argent's AOR, it is lifted only by a solo Colin Blunstone, possessed of one of pop's finest and most distinctive voices, with a string quintet. The voice has lost none of its power nor any of that unique breathiness of delivery.

The second half, however, is a joy. The 12 songs take up barely half an hour; bassist Chris White's and keys wizard Rod Argent's songs of exquisite, melodic, baroque pop, poppier than anything on the aforementioned Beatles disc and, to this reviewer's ears, a far superior selection, closer to a British Pet Sounds than the Fab Four's effort. Unlike certain other grey-haired rock reunions, none of them have "lost it". The performance is dynamic, sublime and, to use an old theatrical cliche, a triumph.

By Ian Smith