Friday 25 February at The Jade
Flinders Street Adelaide.
Review – Geoff Jenke
Peter Head (formerly Beagley) returns to Adelaide for a series of shows at The Jade in Flinders Street. Peter is probably best known as being a member of the bands Headband and The Mount Lofty Ranges. Headband supported Elton John at Memorial Drive in 1972, a show I was lucky enough to be at. The Mount Lofty Ranges played around South Australia in 1973, with a certain Bon Scott often on lead vocals.
The show was 3.30pm on a Friday, obviously catering for the “older” fans who didn’t want to hit town on a Fringe night.
Peter played the show solo, mostly just on a piano. He started the set with “a song I wrote about 50 years ago, in fact one of my first ever songs and it’s called Adelaide” He followed it up with a song called “Hindley Street”, which set the theme for the show, Peter’s life in song. Most rock stars write a book about their life. Peter writes songs about his life.
He moved to a keyboard for a couple of songs, the first being a taste of what “Headband use to play”. The song was, much to the audience delight, the Headband hit, Land of Supercars. Following on, we got a tale about Bon Scott turning up at his place with a couple of songs in his head and needing help to finish them. One was an unrecorded song, Clarissa, a love song that should have seen the light of day in the 70’s. Another song about Peter’s past, Breathalyser Blues was played before he returned to the piano for songs about King’s Cross, Melbourne and then Darwin’s turn with a song about being with Robyn Archer, for whom Peter became Musical Director for a while.
Just when I was thinking Peter’s voice was more Tom Waites than say Mick Jagger, he rolled out a Tom Waites cover. The set finished with a Robyn Archer song and Peter just got up and left the stage. However, he did come into the bar after to mingle with the people.
The show was good, really good. However, it was missing a few songs I think people had expected Peter to play, including me. We only got one Headband song, and a short version of that. There are several songs on the Headband album, A Song for Tooley, that would have suited his style and vocal range. Also, I had expected Round and Round, a song written with Bon Scott.
But these are minor quibbles. Peter’s show was a great mixture of song and stories about the songs. 3.30pm was a good time for the show. Picking up some nice vinyl at a Op Shop and a red curry on the way home made for a great day.
I believe there may be some unreleased Headband music coming out soon. Let’s hope Peter returns when it is released to play some Headband tunes.
Peter plays The Jade again Monday 28 February and Tuesday 1st March at 8.30pm.

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