When she first emerged at the dawn of the 1980s, it was said of Chrissie Hynde that she was the first woman in rock whose sexuality was not only irrelevant but also indistinctive in the context of The Pretenders. Almost 25 years later it could be added that she’s the first woman in rock where age has become similarly irrelevant.
Even in the close-up intimacy of Vicar St., the 50-something Anglo-American rocker doesn’t appear to have changed all that much – all heavy mascara, puffed-up hair and sassy punk attitude.
Performance wise, her voice is arguably better sounding than ever, while the band are shit hot, especially guitarist Adam Seymour and original drummer Martin Chambers (who thumps the skins so hard he has to play behind a glass screen to prevent leakage into the vocal mics). The early part of the show featured highlights from the first two Pretenders albums including gems like ‘Talk Of The Town’, ‘Precious’, a cover of The Kinks ‘Stop You’re Sobbing’ and another Ray Davies song, the sublime ‘I Go To Sleep’. The highlight was undoubtedly the perennially breathtaking ‘Kid’ – the group’s first single and surely their finest hour.
A handful of songs from their most recent album Loose Screw were included and a few rarities from albums like Packed (which Hynde promised the audience wouldn’t recognise “cause you didn’t buy the fucking records did you?”)
Then it was back to the hits – ‘Back On The Chain Gang’, ‘My Baby’, the incendiary ‘Night In My Veins’, their last big hit ‘I’ll Stand By You’ and one of their greatest ‘Don’t Get Me Wrong’, which transmogrified into a slow-burning, cocktail jazz number with Hynde camping it up Peggy Lee style
Some might have been disappointed with the exclusion of ‘Brass In Pocket’ in the set-list but few could have complained about the final parting shot, as drummer Chambers hit the snare on the opening beats of the epic ‘Mystery Achievement’, the final track on that seminal eponymous debut album.
Without doubt, one of the gigs of the year.