Ambrosia; Sellersville, PA 4/20/09

One of my all time faves returned to Sellersville Theater 1894 after five years.

I was sorry I missed them last year at Rosfest(Philly's annual prog rock festival at Keswick Theater) where they had played an extended set of their more progressive rock related album cuts. I was hoping we might get a similar such playlist tonight, but it was back to their more conventional show. But don't get me wrong, an Ambrosia show is always a great thing.

Long time member(1989-2004) Tollak Ollestad was back for this tour to sub for keyboardist David Cutler-Lewis. Tollak, said the band, has relocated to Holland where his career has really taken off. But he remains "on-call" to Ambrosia to fill in back here in the States as needed. And the fact that neither Shem Von Shrek nor Ken Stacey, their other current semi-regular lead singers, were not here meant that Tollak also helped out Joe Puerta on the lead vocals.

Tollak has a nice high voice for the harmonies but I was not as much a fan of his lead singing on Somewhere I've Never Traveled. This one requires a much smoother voice and he was a bit rough sounding. But his more soulful approach in other places in the show sounded really good.

Tonight, most the lead singing was done by bassist Joe Puerta, which worked better for me since his voice has always sounded uncannily close to David Pack's.

Nice, Nice...Very Nice started off things very nicely. Then Joe introduced Mama Don't Understand, explaining that he wrote it back when about his niece's disagreements with her mother...especially about getting married at 18. His niece was just married again on Saturday....to her second husband.

Living on My Own from their album One/Eighty, Joe said, he'd hoped would be a single but it never was for some reason. I myself think it could've been a big hit back then as it has that big bouncy Michael McDonald-era Doobie Brothers feel with that great thudding bass line.

Drummer Burleigh Drummond sang And, the intro to Somewhere I've Never Traveled. Lately the band has been introducing this as having been played at Christine & John McVie's "second wedding" celebration. I wasn't aware they ever were re-married. A bit bizarre, that one.

Burleigh also joked about their former producer/engineer, Alan Parsons saying, "We made his career".
Hopes and Dreams has been played for over 10 years now at Ambrosia shows but has yet to be recorded. It was one of the highlights tonight.

As always, great to hear Time Waits for No One & Angola in the show. The pop reggae feel on the latter really works and the lyrics are done from the point of view of someone who lives in the poverty stricken/war torn country of Angola who can't understand why people in North America whine because they have two "slightly used" cars, a nice air conditioned house and only one TV. Some fine piano playing on Time Waits for No One by Tollak too. Great to see him get a chance to stretch out.

And the encores were two movie songs. The first appeared in a weird 1976 movie, All This & World War II, which had WWII documentary footage with different Beatles songs as the background. Ambrosia had covered Magical Mystery Tour for the soundtrack. And Biggest Part of Me recently appeared in the movie Knocked Up.

The opening act, Just Jane Band, were very good and had a 70s/80s hard rock sound in the Heart/Pat Benatar vein. Young Sarah Jane Hebler was a fine singer with a back up of two guitars, bass & drums who could really play! The drummer, Sarah Jane's dad, said he was honored to be playing with his old friends Ambrosia. He had been their lighting man back in the late 70s.

And, as always, it was cool to hang out with the band in the lobby after the show as they signed autographs and talked about their doings past & present. And I complimented the band on their fine choice of guitarist Doug Jackson as the permanent replacement for David Pack. "He never plays a bum note", I exclaimed. Chris joked, grabbing on to Doug as he walked by. "Well, he did play one bum note once..but then he played another one to make it look natural and no one could tell the difference".

Setlist:

Nice, Nice..Very Nice
Mama Don't Understand
You're the Only Woman
Livin' On My Own
And...
Somewhere I've Never Traveled
Hopes & Dreams
How Much I Feel
Time Waits for No One
Angola
Holding on to Yesterday

Magical Mystery Tour
Biggest Part of Me