Southern rock, blues draw 11,846 at Spa opener

by Steve Webb, The Knickerbocker News, June 16, 1980

The summer officially began at about 7:30 p.m. Saturday when blues guitarist B.B. King’s 10-piece band walked on stage at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center.

The SPAC season had begun, and before a crowd of 11,346 — most of them there to see the headliner Marshall Tucker Band perform a solid 1 1/2 hours of Southern-style country rock. The Tucker Band had returned for its sixth year at the center, and its second year performing two nights running.

(The rain inhibited Sunday night’s performance, which drew only 6,096 amid what a center spokesman termed a downpour.)

It was the first night on the tour that King, the most influential of the electric blues guitarists, opened for the band, a role he will continue to play for much of the next month. The band could be seen clustering at either side of the stage during his set, watching. and reed and keyboard player Jerry Eubanks remarked to him afterward, “By the time this tour finishes, either I’m going to play in your set, or you’re going to have to play in ours.”

The Tucker band started its set with a smooth version of “Running Like the Wind,” the title cut of its 1979 album. The set that followed included many audience favorites, such as the moderate hit singles, “Heard It in a Love Song” and “Last of the Singing Cowboys,” and the songs that established the band, “Can’t You See” and “Take the Highway.” It also included a variety of pieces from the latest album, “Tenth.”

Basically, the band contrasts vocalist Doug Gray’s smooth, strong voice with an often frantic instrumental, situated around the interplay between rhythm guitarist George McCorkle and lead guitarist Toy Caldwell. Drummer Paul Riddle supplies the foundation any two drummers offer in most Southern rock bands, while Eubanks’ various reed parts keep Marshall Tucker from ever sounding like just another boogie band.

The unit’s familiarity working together would normally put a cramp on a new member, and it recently lost bassist Tommy Caldwell in a car accident. Frank Wilkie, however, replaces the late Tommy after knowing the band for 15 years. He fit in well during the set, and several members remarked afterward that he has reached the point where he is confident with his own licks on stage.

The show’s highlights included a fast piece called “Cattle Drive,” the band’s song “Fire on the Mountain” featuring Toy on pedal steel guitar, and the aforementioned standards. Several of these, however — particularly “Take the Highway” during an instrumental section — suffered from the band’s volume. Caldwell’s guitar actually sounded clearer on the lawn than in the theater, which was inaudible during much of the “Take the Highway” lead.

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