<\/p>\n
NORTHAMPTTON \u2014 When The Rolling Stones sing the lyric, \u201cthis could be the last time,\u201d it\u2019s an ultimatum and warning to a wayward romantic partner.<\/p>\n
But when a band of senior citizens uses that line as the title of an annual holiday show, the words take on a different feeling. <\/p>\n
The band, Fat, was one of the first local groups to garner a national record contract back in the 1970s. While no longer a band that regularly plays out, three of the core members \u2014 Peter Newland, Jim Kaminski and Guy DeVito \u2014 have still gotten together for a holiday show over the past decade or so. <\/p>\n
This year\u2019s gig will be at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton on Dec. 27 at 6 p.m. Other notable acts such as Mitch Chakour and Worcester-born Cliff Goodwin, both who played with Joe Cocker at various times, will also be on the bill.<\/p>\n
But it started to occur to frontman Peter Newland that unlike another Stones\u2019 song, time is definitely not on their side. Newland made it clear that he was not trying to scare anyone nor dampen the holiday spirit with the show\u2019s title. He was merely doing the math and didn\u2019t want fans to think that the band had an endless number of shows left.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve always prided ourselves on being a band who is going to die with their boots on. And we\u2019ve managed to overcome a lot of obstacles and barriers, whether it\u2019s a business situation or personality conflicts, and we always found a way to get around them no matter how big they were,\u201d Newland said in a recent interview with The Republican. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut now we\u2019re running into mortality, and whether it be mortality or physical conditions or just other situations with life itself, I just wanted to gently get the idea out there that this thing that we do will be over sometime soon.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course, like most rock \u2018n\u2019 roll acts, Fat was probably seen as being at the height of their powers when they were in their 20s. Newland was an animated frontman who could transfix an audience\u2019s attention with a double-barrel attack of powerful vocals and energetic stage moves. Counterbalanced by the edgy guitar salvos from Jim Kaminski and underpinned by Guy DeVito\u2019s groove-laden basslines, the band had no trouble rising above most other local acts at the time.<\/p>\n
Now, however, the members have aged, so what do they have now to replace the fire and intensity of their youth?<\/p>\n
\u201cI think one of the reasons that young bands are great, especially in rock \u2018n\u2019 roll, is that you don\u2019t know how to play, but if you have a good instinct, you have to invent things that school players probably wouldn\u2019t do,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, one thing we still pride ourselves on is that we make sure we still have that raw element and we still try to bring that sort of garage type of energy.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the frontman, Newland himself especially has to find pathways to keep the energy power of the band focused. Since he no longer leaps around the stage, he leans in on the emotional impact of the songs.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne thing that I\u2019m proud of is that people come up to me all the time and tell me that my voice is as good or better than it was back then, so just let the music do the talking,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, I just fall back on the music and make sure I\u2019m connected to the emotion and that the emotion is young and raw.\u201d <\/p>\n
But Newland still thinks it\u2019s the alchemy of the original members that creates the ongoing magic. He would never want to simply be seen as a nostalgic act; he wants old fans to find new ways to enjoy the music and new fans to discover what the fuss has always been about.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s an ingredient in there that\u2019s hard to find, and that ingredient is time itself. Check whiskey, check wine, it\u2019s the aging process \u2013 and it\u2019s a clich\u00e9 now \u2013 but it\u2019s what makes something superlative,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd when I take the stage with these guys, it\u2019s something I do with reverence. For me it\u2019s rarified air.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.masslive.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" NORTHAMPTTON \u2014 When The Rolling Stones sing the lyric, \u201cthis could be the last time,\u201d it\u2019s an ultimatum and warning to a wayward romantic partner. But when a band of senior citizens uses that line as the title of an annual holiday show, the words take on a different feeling. The band, Fat, was one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2199715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2199715"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199715\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2199716,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199715\/revisions\/2199716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2199715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2199715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2199715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}