Lone original member of Canadian ’70s rockers Prism, Al Harlow is a monster of a talent. They have always been one of my favourite ’70s  rock bands. Espeically because of a strong  Who influence which was evident in Prism’s Feb. 27 show at Average Joes. Judging by an almost full house, they’re  a favourite of a lot of other people too.
 I arrived at the tail end of one of the band’s newer songs, just in time to catch Harlow, who also  handles lead vocal duties, launch into his trademark screeching blues based slide guitar solo. I’m always impressed by that every time I see him play it. This time he wandered into the audience, borrowed a beer bottle and played slide with it then jumped on a table then off again, playing all the while. He grinned ear to ear while doing Pete Townshend windmills and chords
there were some superb newer songs like the exotic ‘Tangiers,’ for which he played a sitar line on his guitar as well as plenty of Prism hits like ‘Young and Restless,’ which had the crowd dancing and singing along, as well as ‘See Forever Eyes,’  plus original  singer Ron Tabak’s favourite ‘Take Me Away,’ on which  Harlow did his dearly departed friend’s memory justice by hitting all of his high notes almost note perfect and lighter-worthy ballad ‘Night to Remember.’ My favourites ‘See Forever Eyes,’ Take Me To The Captain,’ and the talk box solo on ‘Mirror Man’ stood out for me. Of course they ended with ‘Armageddon’ and were called back for an encore of ‘Trouble,’ and crowd pleaser ‘Spaceship Superstar.’

— By Richard Amery, L.A. Beat Editor

{jcomments on}