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Salsa Legend Oscar D’Leon played a one-off gig in the UK at The Roundhouse, Camden, London (www.roundhouse.org.uk) on Saturday 12th July, and this was his first appearance here in 5 years.
I had never seen him live before so was really looking forward to it, especially as everyone I’d spoken to who had seen him before, said that he puts on a fantastic show.
London is a long way from home for me, so I decided to make a weekend of it and stay with friends in High Wycombe. My journey started very early on the Saturday morning and I arrived in High Wycombe at 1pm. After spending the afternoon eating, chatting and listening to Oscar CDs we all got ready for the night ahead and made our way into London.
We arrived at the venue at around 8.30pm just after the doors had opened and there were already a lot of people there, both inside and milling around outside. After showing our tickets we made our way upstairs and into the main room of the Roundhouse and headed straight towards the front of the stage where a small crowd had already started to build up.
The stage was already set up with all the instruments and DJ Lubi was warming the crowd up with his DJ set, followed by DJ Julian Mr. M. The music was great but it was very very dim inside, as the only lights that were on were a few spot lights up on the stage, so unless you were towards the back of the room where light was coming in from the lobby, it was really too dark to dance. This was quite odd as we had an hour and a half to wait before the show was due to begin – some low level lighting was definitely required as you could barely even see people stood just a few feet away from you. As it wasn’t really possible to dance we decided to amuse ourselves with some drinks from the bar :o)
At around 9.30pm Mel and Steve arrived so I went to talk to them. By this time the Roundhouse had really filled up, both in the main space in front of the stage, and in the seated areas above us. The venue is a nice, large, round room with a high domed ceiling, and tiered seating all around the edge and raised above the main space. The floor was just bare concrete though, so although it was smooth it’s not really what I’d call a dancefloor and would soon become very hard on the feet if you danced a lot on it
Shortly after 10pm Oscar and his band came onto the stage and the show began. We had some photo passes which gave us access to the rat run at the front of the stage, so I was able to get some really great photos of Oscar and the band :o)
He kicked off the show with his famous track ‘Lloraras’ and the crowd went nuts. He also performed some of his classic tracks including ‘Que Bueno Baile Usted’ etc. together with covers of some Celia Cruz tracks and Hector Lavoe’s ‘La Murga’. Despite the fact that I had been listening to about 7 of his CDs for the past couple of weeks to familiarise myself with more of his music, there were still lots of tracks that I was unfamiliar with which was a shame – it’s always more enjoyable when you know the songs. When you have produced 50+ albums though, there is a lot of material to choose from.
Just as I had been told, Oscar sang all his songs one track after another, after another without stopping, like one long medley. Also, just as I had expected he was full of energy and had a great voice. Apparently it had been his 65th birthday the day before the gig, but you would never guess this, as his energy was limitless and he was bouncing around the stage like a man half his age!
Every track was given 100%, and not once did his energy or enthusiasm wane – and for the whole show, one track just kept rolling into the next………. for almost 2 ½ hours……….. without a break………. Amazing!!! I have never seen anything like it before.
After the mammoth show ended (the longest live show I’ve ever seen) the DJs re-appeared and played more music for the crowd to dance to. The majority of people seemed to leave after the show finished though, and by this time the floor was littered with paper, empty plastic glasses and lots of spilt drinks – the lights were still out too, so all in all it wasn’t the best environment for dancing. We had a few dances though, but soon decided to call it a night and head off. We left at around 1.15am, but the DJs were still playing and there were still quite a few people left.
It’s nice to have the option of some dancing after a gig ends because you are always on a high, but unless you have the right venue with a proper dancefloor I’m not so sure it’s such a good idea, and the Roundhouse whilst being a great venue for live music, wasn’t really the right type of place for a dancing night in my humble opinion.
It was well worth the trip and every penny spent on the ticket though for the show alone…….. and you definitely got your money’s worth. A great night was had by all and we left happy.
I loved the band's pair of congas too which were all sparkly with holographic speckles :o)
Next up on my whistle-stop tour of live latin music will be Jimmy Bosch at the Salsology 5th Birthday Party…………
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