Venue: Whitchurch Festival                 Date: Sunday 4th August

Set list: Focus, House of the King, Focus 2, Eruption (excerpt), Focus 3, Sylvia, Focus 5, La Cathedrale de Strasbourg, Harum Scarum, Focus 7, flute solo, Hocus Pocus.
Encores: Brother, Neurotica

This is a band I never thought I would see live so, as a huge fan, I was pretty excited about their appearance at this year's Whitchurch festival. Yet I was apprehensive.  Would I be seeing the true article or a tribute band? With only one original member on show - the eccentric yet talented Thijs Van Leer - and without the versatile, distinctive guitar of Jan Akkerman this could have been awful.

I need not have worried. They were superb.  For the uninitiated, Focus were a largely instrumental band from Holland, whose fifteen minutes of fame came around 1972 when they had two hit singles, the melodic instrumental 'Sylvia' and the nutty hard rock/yodelling classic 'Hocus Pocus'. Believe me, you've heard them.  Mainly an album band, they played a mixture of medieval influenced progressive rock and blues-tinged jazz, before fading away in the mid to late 70s.

Thijs, sitting behind a battered old Hammond, had brought a superb rhythm section of Bobby Jacobs (bass) and Bert Smakk (drums) with him.  But, of course, the role of guitarist was all-important, and the excellent Jan Dumee certainly delivered the goods, reproducing Akkerman's melody lines with ease, while also, in his solos, suggesting his light-fingered, jazzy style.

For some (though possibly typical) eccentric reason, the set represented a chronological journey through the band's history (uncontroversially ignoring their last two albums), from the bluesy jam of 'Focus' via the jaunty flute-led 'House of the King' and the sublime, jazzy 'Focus 2', to the progressive epic 'Eruption' and the powerful 'Harum Scarum' - all played with obvious joy by the whole band.

Thijs, in particular not only plays a mean flute and organ, but sings, yodels and even whistles - in perfect tune! The band left the chronology behind to close the main set with a splendid 'Hocus Pocus'.  Newer songs were left for the encores, and showed considerable promise for things to come, while retaining the trademark Focus style.

It's great to see them back, let's hope they stay around a while!

Stephen Lambe