THE Rev Dr Clive Jackson rides his Harley Davidson into the Palace Theatre on Friday, February 20, to convene a surgery of musical homage to the American classics.
Complete with trademark long hair, weird eye makeup and big, swishing flares, Doctor and the Medics’ singer is bringing a show called Route 66 to the Westcliff theatre.
It represents a musical journey through the best of American country, rock and pop music – a tribute to all time greats from Johnny Cash to Elvis, to the Eagles, Meatloaf and Bruce Springsteen.
“I’m really enjoying the show.” says Clive, 47. “It’s has been a new challenge for me,”
The band scored a number one hit in 32 countries in the Eighties with a reworking of the hippy anthem, Spirit in the Sky.
“Doctor and the Medics are still going strong,” he adds. “We do 90 gigs a year – from Butlins to hairy bikers’ dos – but Route 66 has been a completely different direction for me.
“I got a call right out the blue from an agent asking me if I wanted to do it. I was a bit wary, to be honest, as everybody in the show is half my age and really talented and entertaining.
“It’s made me pull my socks up, but it’s all gone really well. It’s a brilliant show, which covers the whole spectrum of American music through all the symbolic artists, with projections on stage adding a visual effect.
“We’ve even got a bar on the stage set – that was my addition!”
“It’s been great fun,” he enthuses. “There’s not many gigs where you get to sing a Johnny Cash medley and then, straight after that, belt out another performance as the undisputed King of rock ‘n’ roll.
“I’m the slim, good looking Elvis of course – not the fat one. I’m Elvis on a diet. I reckon being a doctor must make me a TIme Lord from Memphis or something!
“I even get to sing Spirit in the Sky, which was originally written by American singer-songwriter Norman Greenbaum. It couldn’t have worked out any better.
“I reckon about 10 per cent of the songs we do wouldn’t make my CD collection. But that’s the beauty of the show, there really is something for everyone, no matter who you are or how old you are.”
Clive doesn’t actually have a doctorate, but he tells me he is a bona fide reverend.
“I seriously wanted to be a doctor,” says the singer, who is a dead ringer for spaced out Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy pilot Zaphod Beeblebrox – but with just the one head!
“I went to the interview for medical school, but punk was just finishing and I still had bright pink hair. The board didn’t like the look of me, so I just offered to get my coat and walked out. The title has just stuck over the years.
“I got ordained in America, so I could marry my old bassist to his wife. It was a lovely ceremony in the Florida Keys. That title is completely real.”
Doctor and the Medics began life in 1981 as a psychedelic hybrid off all things glam, rock and pop, complete with a novel female backing duo, the Anadin Brothers.
The girls, Colette Appleby and Wendi West, would be plastered with white face paint, finished off with a black Siouxsie Sioux eye, and had a habit of moving their arms to the music in mirror fashion, Clive says was perfected as competitive synchronised swimmers.
“The girls don’t perform in the band any more,” he adds. “They packed up in the mid-Nineties.
“Colette is a yoga teacher and now works as a body double in films for the likes of Gwyneth Paltrow. Wendi is my wife and has had four of my kids. She is actually a local girl, from Rayleigh, so we know the Southend area very well.
“We live in Wales now, but come back here a lot, as she has a brother on Canvey and aunties and uncles.
“I’ve replaced them both in the band. Instead of the Anadin Brothers we have a new girl, Melissa, and a 16-stone psychobilly. It seems to be working out pretty well.”
After finishing the Route 66 tour, Clive is preparing to record a new album.
He says: “I want to get something new out this year, but I haven’t decided if it will be as Doctor and the Medics, or just the good Doctor yet.
“I’ve got my own record label, Madman, which will be releasing it. If you liked the last four albums we did, you should enjoy the new one, too.
“I’m old enough to realise it’s highly unlikely I’m ever going to have a big hit again.
“But as long as I can keep recording, gigging, having fun and entertaining people to pay the bills then I’m a very happy man indeed.”
Amen, reverend!
* Tickets for the show at the Palace, on February 20, start at £13.50 (£12.50 concessions) and doors open at 8pm. Box office: 01702 351135.
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