Good morning judge: 10CC is coming to Geelong

Among the most inventive and influential bands in the history of popular music, 10cc have achieved commercial, critical and creative success in equal measure.

The English band, which will play in Geelong later this year, have produced a string of hits and classic tracks, including “I’m Not In Love”, “The Things We Do For Love”, “Rubber Bullets”, “Dreadlock Holiday” (with its instantly recognisable chorus “I don’t like cricket – I love it!”), “Donna”, “The Wall Street”, “Art For Art’s Sake”,”People In Love”, “Good Morning Judge” and “Life Is A Minestrone”.

10cc has sold more than 30 million albums worldwide, while “I’m Not In Love” has been played more than five million times on radio, featured in the films Guardians Of The Galaxy and Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason, and has been covered by The Pretenders, Peggy Lee, Richie Havens, Fun Lovin’ Criminals and most recently The Flaming Lips. Guns ‘n’ Roses frontman Axl Rose once said: “that song messes with my life, man it’s one of my favourite songs of all time.”

“Dreadlock Holiday”, a crowd favourite and unofficial cricket anthem, was featured in Academy Award-winning 2010 film The Social Network. “Rubber Bullets”, which delivered band members Gouldman, Godley and Crème two Ivor Novello Awards (the UK’s highest songwriting accolade), celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.

To mark five decades in the business, 10cc are celebrating in style, and far from resting on the laurels, will be spending the year breaking new ground. “The band is sounding fantastic!” 10cc leader Graham Gouldman said. “Our main strength is the songs. Hit after hit after hit. It’s relentless. We show no mercy.”

Gouldman puts 10cc’s longevity down to the quality and individuality of the band’s tracks. “They don’t seem to date. We never followed any trend we simple wrote for our own pleasure. The fact that the songs are being played as often on the radio today as they ever were shows how true that is.”

In the 1970s, a time when the charts were dominated by some of the most creative and colourful artistes in pop history, 10cc worked not on image or celebrity status, but on the art of making highly sophisticated rock masterworks into simple-sounding pop hits. The result was some of the most distinctive pop records of the 20th century. As Rolling Stone put it in 1975: ‘There is more going on in one 10cc song than on 10 Yes albums.’

“Year on year we get busier and busier. It’s great, we love touring and playing together and we get on really well,” Gouldman said.

“The audiences these days are very gratifying. You get the people you would expect, who grew up with 10cc, but you also get young kids who know the songs too.

“Now whether they’ve discovered 10cc for themselves, via the internet or radio, or just grown up with their parents playing it in the house, I don’t know. But we get a great mix of people from the generations.”

The live band’s line-up is:

Graham Gouldman – bass, guitars, vocals

Rick Fenn – lead guitar, vocals, bass

Paul Burgess – drums, percussion

Mick Wilson – vocals, percussion, guitar, keyboards

Mike Stevens – keyboards, guitar, bass, sax, vocals.

10cc will perform at Costa Hall, Geelong on June 24.

For more information or for tickets, head to davidroywilliams.com