THE BOOTLEG BEATLES – BRIGHTON CENTRE 20.12.25
OK so it’s heading towards Christmas and things start to get a tad cheesy on the music front, and so we thought, “Yeah, why not!” and so we booked in to review a trio of vastly different tribute (or if you prefer homage) performances across three consecutive days here in Brighton. Day One featured the London Concert Orchestra performing their take on the film music of Hanz Zimmer and John Williams at the Brighton Centre – Read that review HERE. Day Two featured Absolute Bowie performing their take on David Bowie at the Concorde 2 – Read that review HERE. Day Three is today and features The Bootleg Beatles performing their take on The Beatles at the Brighton Centre.
There’s no denying it that The Bootleg Beatles are “The world’s premier Beatles tribute band” and have been entertaining audiences around the globe since their inception in 1980, which was the year of John Lennon’s untimely death. The Bootleg Beatles were formed by Andre Barreau, Neil Harrison and David Catlin-Birch, fellow London cast members of ‘Beatlemania’, following the final show of the West End musical. The Bootleg Beatles first performance was at a small student gathering in Tiverton in Devon and following more low-profile gigs, the band then performed a 60-date tour of the Soviet Union, the Far East, and India and then in February 1984, they were invited to perform in the USA to commemorate The Beatles’ initial US tour 20 years earlier. Then in 2002, the band played at Elizabeth II’s Golden Jubilee Party at Buckingham Palace, they had well and truly arrived!
The idea is to really absorb yourself into the characters of John, Paul, George and Ringo and forget who is portraying them. However, The Bootleg Beatles are kept fresh and every so often bandmembers leave or are replaced. Thus far there have been 10 previous band members, comprising of 3 former McCartney’s, Lennon’s, and Starr’s and 1 previous Harrison. Today’s lineup at the Brighton Centre is Paul Canning as John Lennon on vocals, guitar, and keys; Miles Frizzell as Paul McCartney on vocals, bass, and keys; Stephen Hill as George Harrison on guitar and vocals; and Gordon Elsmore as Ringo Starr on drums and vocals. They are assisted by Steve Irlam on keyboards and percussion as well as the 8 strong Bootleg Beatles Orchestra who are taking care of instruments like trumpet, piccolo trumpet, French horn, flute, backing vocals, percussion, saxophone, trombone, violin, swarmandal, viola, cello and fireman’s bell.
There’s usually a theme when The Bootleg Beatles tour and this time around they are celebrating The Beatles top five selling albums, namely the Dylan influenced ‘Rubber Soul’ (released 3rd December 1965), the experimental ‘Revolver’ (released 5th August 1966), ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ (released 26th May 1967) heralding the Summer of Love and psychedelia, ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’ (released 22nd November 1968) with its glorious eclectic mish mash of styles, and their grand finale , the musically sophisticated ‘Abbey Road’ (released 26th September 1969).
These Beatles albums were each as ground-breaking as its predecessor, and each LP was uniquely diverse, and this evening 37 choice cuts are brought to life on the Brighton Centre stage in one very special concert by The Bootleg Beatles and their merry band of gifted backing musicians for their final performance of 2025. The evening is split into two halves with the first running from 7:30pm until 8:33pm and the second half starting at 8:55pm and taking us through to the close at 10:10pm.
The house lights go down and there’s much anticipation amongst the mixed aged crowd. The stage itself is still in darkness, however a flashing video montage starts to be projected against the rear wall of the stage, and this depicts a wide menagerie of early 1960s culture, events and individuals. Snippets of music from the time accompanies the video, commencing with ‘My Generation’ by The Who and leading into ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ from Bob Dylan, and then onto ‘Tracks Of My Tears’ by The Miracles, ‘Dancing In The Street’ from Martha And The Vandellas, and finally ‘She’s Not There’ by The Zombies. We are fully primed for The Bootleg Beatles homage to ‘Rubber Soul’ as the lights come up to reveal John, Paul, George and Ringo in position and they take it away with the Lennon and McCartney composed ‘Drive My Car’ from the 1965 ‘Rubber Soul’ album, which sees the writers characters sharing lead vocals. The fab four are wearing black suits, white shirts and black ties and are accompanied by Steve Irlam on percussion and piano.
Paul greets the crowd first with “Ta and good evening Brighton!”. They then launch into ‘Nowhere Man’ which history has written as coming to Lennon fully formed one night at his home in Surrey after he had struggled to write anything for several hours. The song reflects the existential concerns raised by his experiences with LSD. On the record it’s credited to Lennon and McCartney. Selection three from ‘Rubber Soul’ is the less well known ‘You Won’t See Me’ which sees John on piano and this was penned by McCartney and is said to reflect the difficulties he was experiencing in his relationship with actress Jane Asher due to her refusal to put her acting career second to his needs. The Bootleg Beatles pay great attention to detail and the band’s body during this five song section are still like their early days Gerry Anderson puppets movements that the Beatles used to do, these being particularly prevalent during ‘In My Life’. The lyrics were penned by Lennon and evoke his youth in Liverpool and reflect his nostalgia for a time before the onset of international fame. McCartney recalled writing the melody on his own and said that the song’s musical inspiration came from Smokey Robinson and the Miracles. The final ‘Rubber Soul’ offering wasn’t the obvious ‘Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)’ or ‘Michelle’ but in fact the deeper cut of ‘The Word’.
The houselights then extinguished and we were given the second video compilation of the night as a lead into 1966’s ‘Revolver’ album. The partial tunes for this film were ‘Sunny Afternoon’ by The Kinks as the intro as well as the outro, and sandwiched in between were ‘Keep On Running’ from The Spencer Davis Group, ‘River Deep – Mountain High’ by Ike & Tina Turner, ‘God Only Knows’ from The Beach Boys, and ‘Eight Miles High’ by The Byrds.
The houselights come up again, and just like before, The Bootleg Beatles are on stage, and this time they are all wearing red shirts, and are sporting black suits. They kick off with George Harrison’s ‘Taxman’ which is the opening number from 1966’s ‘Revolver’. This is the first of a half-dozen cuts from the original LP. This was penned as a backlash to Harold Wilson’s Labour government taxation rates for high income earners, which by now included the Beatles. A quartet of strings from The Bootleg Beatles Orchestra add extra depth for ‘Revolver’ selection two, this being Lennon and McCartney’s ‘Eleanor Rigby’ with Paul on lead vocals. John takes over vocal duties for the ‘And Your Bird Can Sing’ deeper cut. My younger childhood is revisited with the performance of ‘Yellow Submarine’ which was originally on 1966’s ‘Revolver’ album, but I remember it from 1969’s ‘Yellow Submarine’ soundtrack album to the animated film of the same name. Ringo has the lead vocal for this and it’s the first of his jovial limelights this evening. Suffice to say, the audience were really into this track and there were handclaps a plenty, plus the whole Orchestra octet were playing along.
It’s fair to say that the vast number of Beatles songs are very much of their time and many sound really dated today. However……I’m going to throw this out there, that there’s one solitary song that could be released in 2026 and thousands would believe it to be a brand new composition. I’m referring to the epic ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ which still feels fresh. It’s incomprehensible that this was written when we were winning the World Cup. The planet has vastly changed since those days and yet here we have ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ which will be 60 years old next year! This song is groundbreaking as much of the backing track consists of a series of prepared tape loops, (an idea that originated with McCartney) and was influenced by the work of avant-garde artists such as Karlheinz Stockhausen who regularly experimented with magnetic tape and musique concrète techniques. This evening we learned that this was originally to be called ‘The Void’. John is on lead vocals, Ringo is a joy on the drums, and the 8-piece orchestra adds effects and depth of sound. If you are one of the 99,000 people who purchased ‘Setting Sun’ by the Chemical Brothers (featuring vocals from Noel Gallagher) from 30th September 1996 to 6th October 1996, then you got the tune to debut at No.1 in the UK Singles Chart. I wonder where they got the sounds and idea from? Anyone know?
The final ‘Revolver’ offering for tonight was the ‘Got To Get You Into My Life’ earworm. After which the houselights went down again and video compilation three was played. This featured snippets of ‘Strange Brew’ from Cream, ‘Venus In Furs’ by The Velvet Underground, ‘Strange Days’ from The Doors, ‘White Rabbit’ by Jefferson Airplane, ‘A Whiter Shade Of Pale’ from Procol Harum, ‘She’s A Rainbow’ by The Rolling Stones and ‘Hole In My Shoe’ from Traffic. This led into album three ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’.
Lights up and the fab four are naturally dressed in the world-famous ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ garb and they perform 7 of the 13 tunes from the iconic record, commencing with album opener ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ which segues into ‘With A Little Help From My Friends’, which sees Ringo on lead vocals as he wrote the song. Surprisingly, Lennon’s ‘Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds’, which is track three on the album, is not played this evening and instead the lesser offering of ‘Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite!’ is given an outing and the octet come into their own. The audience lightheartedly cheer each time the fireman’s bell is stuck during McCartney’s music hall styled earworm ‘When I’m Sixty-Four’, which is followed by the truly wonderful ‘She’s Leaving Home’ for which Lennon and McCartney received the 1967 Ivor Novello award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically. This, along with ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ were the two standout tracks of the night for yours truly. I suspect everyone in the audience will each have their own favourites as well. The final two cuts from ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ this evening were ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)’ and ‘A Day In The Life’, with the latter featuring George on acoustic guitar and John on lead vocals…“I read the news today, oh boy; About a lucky man who made the grade…”. It’s now 8:33pm and the band gathers centre stage for photo opportunities and then leaves us for 22 minutes, allowing enough time for the punters to share banter, have comfort breaks or top up their liquid refreshments….
Part two commences at 8:55pm with the fourth video film of the evening. This is to get us primed for ‘The Beatles’ album aka “The White Album”. There are images from the time nostalgically blasted across the screen along with parts of the following tunes: ‘Street Fighting Man’ (The Rolling Stones), ‘America’ (Simon & Garfunkel), ‘Lazy Sunday’ (Small Faces), ‘Voodoo Child’ (The Jimi Hendrix Experience), ‘Think’ (Aretha Franklin), and finally ‘Fire Brigade’ by The Move featuring a pre-Wizzard Roy Wood.
Lights up and the fab four are all sporting their hippy looks from the time which includes denim jeans and long hair. “The White Album” runs in excess of 90 minutes and contains no less than 30 tracks, with some of these being more immediate than others. It was interesting to see what The Bootleg Beatles will cull from this. In the end they selected 8 numbers and this time they didn’t select the album opener McCartney’s ‘Back In The U.S.S.R., but in fact settled on tune two, a track that Siouxsie & The Banshees very much made their own, namely Lennon’s ‘Dear Prudence’, which was written in Rishikesh during the Beatles trip to India in early 1968. It was inspired by actress Mia Farrow’s sister, Prudence Farrow, who became obsessive about meditating while practising with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
Interestingly, this has reminded me of something I was told in the mid 1980’s, when I was touring Egypt. We were lucky to have one of the top tour guides as part of our journey around Aswan, Abu Simbel, Luxor, and Cairo and he told us that just a few years previous he was fortunate enough to be the personal guide for Hollywood legend Bette Davis and as he was showing her around, he kept asking her maid to take photos of him with Bette on his camera, which she kindly kept doing. Then a few months later he found out that the photographer wasn’t actually Bette’s maid but was in fact Mia Farrow and that they were shooting the Agatha Christie 1978 epic ‘Death On The Nile’.
Back at the Brighton Centre and the second selection from “The White Album” is up next and this is the opener on side three, ‘Birthday’, which tonight had the feel of a late 1970’s tune as opposed to one hailing from 1968. George Harrison’s ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ came next with George on vocals and this strangely reminded me of Blur. Judging by the audience’s applause, this was a very popular choice. Paul was on keys and vocals next for ‘Martha My Dear’ which was named after his Old English Sheepdog, Martha. There were a couple of lesser known tunes next in the form of Lennon’s ‘Glass Onion’ and Harrison’s ‘Savoy Truffle’ which ran together. The tempo certainly picked up with the arrival of ‘Revolution’ which witnesses many handclaps and even some fans now dancing in the aisles.
It was back to my early childhood with the performance of McCartney’s ‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’ for which he encouraged the whole auditorium to stand and dance. Scanning around, it appeared that around 90% of those present took him up on his offer and I reckon this would have been many a soul’s top tune tonight. They rounded off “The White Album” with ‘Mother Nature’s Son’ with just Paul and George on acoustic guitars and the horn section. I thought that this sound was signalling what was to come later after the Beatles from McCartney, and in particular the Wings ‘London Town’ album. I would have honestly much preferred the inclusion of ‘Helter Skelter’ instead of ‘Glass Onion’ and ‘Savoy Truffle’, but I guess you can’t win them all.
Houselights out for the final video of the evening that was to lead us into 1969’s 17 tune ‘Abbey Road’ album. The music snippets on this film were ‘Whole Lotta Love’ by Led Zeppelin), ‘Pinball Wizard’ from The Who, ‘Gimme Shelter’ by The Rolling Stones, and ‘Space Oddity’ from David Bowie. Houselights up and the quartet’s clothes match the fab four walking across the crossing on the famous cover of the album. Steve Irlam gets a namecheck here for keyboards and percussion as they open the 8-tune selection of ‘Abbey Road’ section with ‘Because’ which was one of few Beatles recordings to feature a Moog synthesiser, played at the time by George Harrison. Tune two was album opener ‘Come Together’, which was followed by ‘Something’ with George on lead vocals. It was Ringo’s turn to be in the limelight again as a cult hero figure as he hit his stix on his drumkit as he sang his way through ‘Octopus’s Garden’ for which he did get the writing credits. It is historically said that the idea for the song came about when Ringo was on a boat belonging to comedian Peter Sellers in Sardinia in 1968. He ordered fish and chips for lunch, but instead of fish he got squid which he had never eaten before. The boat’s captain then told Ringo about how octopuses travel along the sea bed picking up stones and shiny objects with which to build gardens.
Normality resumed with George’s ‘Here Comes The Sun’ which he penned in Eric Clapton’s house in Surrey, and many of a certain age will recall being used as the theme tune to the BBC’s ‘Holiday’ programme with presenter Cliff Michelmore in the mid 1970’s, as well as being a hit for Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel at the same time, and it was the first cover version that the band had chosen to record. We were informed that they were going to play a medley next. These mirrored the order of a trio of short tunes on ‘Abbey Road’, namely ‘Golden Slumbers’, ‘Carry That Weight’ and ‘The End’.
After this, they left the stage but thankfully returned to rattle off two more contrasting tunes. The first being the 1968 ‘Hey Jude’ single which did eventually crop up as the lead tune on the 1970 ‘Hey Jude’ compilation album. This was another tune from my childhood and was an enjoyable listen. There was now a large majority of fans standing and swaying to the beat with one arm waving in the air. Some had their phone lights on as in to mimic the days of old when folk used to do this with their lighters. This was a very popular choice. The night ended with them saying they are going to take it right back to the beginning and their take of The Top Notes ‘Twist And Shout’ from 1963 ‘Please Please Me’ album. The octet were really going for it by shaking their booties with their Santa hats on. This rounded off an enjoyable evening. As folk left the venue the Christmas theme continued with the outro tape playing ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)’, the 1971 John Lennon And Yoko Ono And The Plastic Ono Band With The Harlem Community Choir single, which is also now currently sitting at No.22 on the UK Singles Chart this week, and Paul McCartney’s ‘Wonderful Christmastime’ is currently sitting slightly higher at No. 18. Which just goes to show that you can’t keep great tunes down! Merry Christmas!
The Bootleg Beatles:
Paul Canning (John Lennon) – vocals, guitar, keys
Miles Frizzell (Paul McCartney) – vocals, bass, keys
Stephen Hill (George Harrison) – guitar, vocals
Gordon Elsmore (Ringo Starr) – drums, vocals
Steve Irlam – keyboards, percussion
Bootleg Beatles Orchestra:
Matt Grocutt – trumpet, piccolo trumpet
Vanessa King – French horn, flute, vocals, percussion
Katie Samways and/or Jim Fieldhouse – flute, saxophone
Chris Cole and/or Lewis Rowlands – trombone
Tom Bott – violin, swarmandal
Sarah Chapman – viola
Sheila Holdsworth – viola
Robert Woollard – cello, fireman’s bell
The Bootleg Beatles setlist of Beatles songs:
Set One:
‘Rubber Soul’ intro video featuring snippets of ‘My Generation’ (The Who), ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ (Bob Dylan), ‘Tracks Of My Tears’ (The Miracles), ‘Dancing In The Street’ (Martha And The Vandellas), and ‘She’s Not There’ (The Zombies)
‘Drive My Car’ (from 1965 ‘Rubber Soul’ album)
‘Nowhere Man’ (from 1965 ‘Rubber Soul’ album)
‘You Won’t See Me’ (from 1965 ‘Rubber Soul’ album)
‘In My Life’ (from 1965 ‘Rubber Soul’ album)
‘The Word’ (from 1965 ‘Rubber Soul’ album)
‘Revolver’ intro video featuring snippets of ‘Sunny Afternoon’ (The Kinks), ‘Keep On Running’ (The Spencer Davis Group), ‘River Deep – Mountain High’ (Ike & Tina Turner), ‘God Only Knows’ (The Beach Boys), ‘Eight Miles High’ (The Byrds), and ‘Sunny Afternoon’ (The Kinks) again.
‘Taxman’ (from 1966 ‘Revolver’ album)
‘Eleanor Rigby’ (from 1966 ‘Revolver’ album)
‘And Your Bird Can Sing’ (from 1966 ‘Revolver’ album)
‘Yellow Submarine’ (from (from 1966 ‘Revolver’ album & 1969 ‘Yellow Submarine’ album)
‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ (from 1966 ‘Revolver’ album)
‘Got To Get You Into My Life’ (from 1966 ‘Revolver’ album)
‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ intro video featuring snippets of ‘Strange Brew’ (Cream), ‘Venus In Furs’ (The Velvet Underground), ‘Strange Days’ (The Doors), ‘White Rabbit’ (Jefferson Airplane), ‘A Whiter Shade Of Pale’ (Procol Harum), ‘She’s A Rainbow’ (The Rolling Stones) and ‘Hole In My Shoe’ (Traffic)
‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
‘With A Little Help From My Friends’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
‘Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite!’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
‘When I’m Sixty-Four’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
‘She’s Leaving Home’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
‘A Day In The Life’ (from 1967 ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ album)
Set Two:
‘The White Album’ intro video featuring snippets of ‘Street Fighting Man’ (The Rolling Stones), ‘America’ (Simon & Garfunkel), ‘Lazy Sunday’ (Small Faces), ‘Voodoo Child’ (The Jimi Hendrix Experience), ‘Think’ (Aretha Franklin), and ‘Fire Brigade’ (The Move)
‘Dear Prudence’ (from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Birthday’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Martha My Dear’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Glass Onion’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Savoy Truffle’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Revolution’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Mother Nature’s Son’ from 1968 ‘The Beatles’ aka ‘The White Album’)
‘Abbey Road’ intro video featuring snippets of ‘Whole Lotta Love’ (Led Zeppelin), ‘Pinball Wizard’ (The Who), ‘Gimme Shelter’ (The Rolling Stones), and ‘Space Oddity’ (David Bowie)
‘Because’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘Come Together’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘Something’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘Octopus’s Garden’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘Here Comes The Sun’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘Golden Slumbers’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘Carry That Weight’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
‘The End’ (from 1969 ‘Abbey Road’ album)
(encore)
‘Hey Jude’ (a 1968 single & from 1970 ‘Hey Jude’ compilation album)
‘Twist And Shout’ (The Top Notes cover) (from 1963 ‘Please Please Me’ album)
(Outro tape) ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)’ (a 1971 John Lennon And Yoko Ono And The Plastic Ono Band With The Harlem Community Choir single)
