Classics strike right note with crowd

It’s a long, long road and it took the Hollies to New Plymouth on Friday night. And it was the kind of perfect night – sunny, cloudless sky, no wind – that the Bowl of Brooklands comes into its own. And for the audience of 3000 there was plenty of room to set up the chairs, spread out the rugs and settle in for the night.

The Hollies, looking out across the water, joked with the crowd that they looked far too young to remember these songs. ‘‘But you are far, far away.’’

A new song, sung for first time in New Plymouth, got a polite round of applause, but it was the songs from back in the day – Jennifer Eccles, Bus Stop, On A Carousel, Sorry Suzanne, Magic Woman Touch, Just One Look – that got people singing along and a few up dancing.

Eifion and Gillian Williams hadn’t been to a Hollies concert before and were enjoying the music.

‘‘We’re from the generation that used to like them,’’ Eifion Williams said.

The couple, originally from Corban Bay in North Wales have been in Taranaki for 12 years, but Eifion lived in Urenui, from

1966 to 1969.

‘‘I can remember going to The Seekers concert in 1969 when I was 9 or 10. That was packed.’’

While the majority of concert goers would have remembered the Hollies from the band’s heyday in the 1960s and 70s, there were a smattering of younger people.

Friends Hannah Stevens, 14, and Ellen Crowley, 15, used the

25 minute break to fill up their water bottles. While their music preferences tend more towards rap, they were quite enjoying the concert, they said. The girls had come with their parents, who were fans.

The Hollies are on their The Road is Long 2019 New Zealand tour. – Helen Harvey