Money Isn’t Everything

They may be based in Newcastle-upon-Tyne but Rob Heron & the Tea Pad Orchestra have fallen for old-time Americana hook, line and sinker. Influenced as much by modern-day US bands like Pokey LaFarge & the South City Three as Milton Brown, Fats Waller and Django Reinhardt, the band plays Western swing, Gypsy jazz, country blues and ragtime. Yet while they perform suited and booted in the apparel of the 20s and 30s, the youthful sextet is not entirely lost in their chosen era. Original songs tell wryly witty contemporary stories. The bustling honky-tonk of ‘Great Fire of Byker’ describes a Tyneside scrapyard fire. Heron’s mournful yodelling on ‘Bank Failures’ laments today’s financial problems while the oom-pah drawl of ‘Rich Man Now’ takes its protagonist from penniless waiter to outlaw hero.

With a relentlessly upbeat tempo and generous dollops of humour, Money Isn't Everything is light-hearted fare, but it is great fun. Individual Tea Pad Orchestra solos are mostly short but razor-sharp while Heron’s singing has the fullness and brio to make his stories sparkle. The band has worked hard to keep the tone varied. But such a straightahead approach to the music of the jazz age inevitably has its limits on record. Rob Heron & the Tea Pad Orchestra are surely best enjoyed in a saloon or dance hall.