Procol are rained off at the Ford Amphitheatre ... while the moist crowd waits for the band to return, Jens and Roland take the opportunity to parade a huge banner, made for BtP by Neal Fischer, round the auditorium. As a consequence, BB King's Club has a good audience of new people who hadn't been at the festival proper
Gary Shepard, Tito Davila, Charlie Kirelawich and George himself. These photos were despatched to BtP by Mike Pacey, a colleague of George's, who wasn't in LA: his wonderful caption for this picture was 'George and another PH-shirted friend along with two other, less sartorially-splendid friends'
Roland at the piano, Jens on the drums, and Gary on guitar, Donna Blue at the microphone, and Paler stalwart Richard Beck, in his third Palers' Band incarnation, on the electric bass. This particular combination of personnel played only Conquistador, we think.
Procol Harum arrived at the club, around midnight, as the Palers' Band was playing. Though Gary was heard to express his genial reservations about a certain professional songstress tackling his material, he certainly didn't have a word to say against the singing he heard from Donna Blue (... and nor did Geoff Whitehorn!)
Marvellously Procol Harum then took the stage and played a five-song set on the Palers' gear. Matt had to cope with a four-string bass, Geoff with a rather long guitar-strap! Despite the late hour , and the many drinks that fans had bought them, they provided Unique Entertainment as always.
Gary at the 'Gary' piano. Roland had asked the hire company for an RD 600, the piano he plays back home, and was mildly irked to be offered the less-familiar RD 700 instead, though the instrument was fresh out of the box. It turned out, however, that Procol themselves had got that company's RD 600 at the Ford ... and got it very wet!
George and Matthew Fisher ... we think that Matthew is holding an envelope containing his copy of George's 'Procol Pilgrimage' essay, which the band greatly enjoyed, and which you can read here
Gary gets to meet Gary
Mike Pacey's caption for this picture of Geoff and George reads, 'George and a friend, who is enjoying a brief reality hiatus'. Geoff actually enjoyed a similar hiatus on stage at the Fillmore a couple of days later!
And finally, an enduring memory for all who were there: Gary with Nicola and Sarah, daughters of
BJ Wilson, whom we also saw at the following night's concert in San Diego.