See Dragon live at the Great Western Hotel Arena on Friday 26th July!
Doors open 530pm
Support Acts from 630pm
When the classic Dragon line-up of Marc and Todd Hunter, Robert Taylor, Paul Hewson and Kerry Jacobson reunited in 1982 it was with the intention of clearing debts from the decade before. But a hit song with lyrics that grew from a nursery rhyme, and the following album and tour, had them scaling the highest peaks of the Australian charts again.
In 1983 Dragon took to the brand new Rhinoceros Studios in East Sydney Al Mansfield producing and turned out a bunch of tracks too good to be ignored.
Michael Crawley, the A&R man for Polygram Records heard the band playing Rain from the corridor of the studio and famously stormed into the control room doors shouting “What’s that song, I’ve got to have it!” followed closely by “What band are you?” Luckily Crawley, a recent import from the UK, was not familiar with Dragon’s wild ways and daunting behaviour.
The resulting album was ‘Body And The Beat’, a platinum selling record that dominated the charts in Australia in the mid 1980s. This was the album that kicked off Dragon’s Stadium Years and it was Paul Hewson, Kerry Jacobson and Robert Taylor’s final recorded outing with the band after many productive and epic years.
Doane Perry from Jethro Tull and Al Mansfield from Robert Palmer’s band and the guitar legend Tommy Emmanuel joined the band and they toured Europe with Tina Turner until the realities of having children saw them come home and play Australia and NZ until Marc died in 1998.
After a ten year hibernation Todd reformed the band and Mark Williams, Pete Drummond, Bruce Reid started playing the Dragon songs and have played thousands of shows since then.
And now, in 2024 Dragon are taking to the road to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of that iconic release.
In an exclusive show Dragon will play all five singles from the Body And The Beat album plus Dragon’s top ten hits from all eras.
This is a show not to be missed as Dragon storm their way through the hits from the record like Wilder World, Cry, Magic, Body & The Beat and Rain and finish the night with the crowd singing anthems like April Sun In Cuba, Celebrate, Speak No Evil and Are You Old Enough.
When the album was released Dragon toured Australia on the Body And The Beat Tour. They leased two planes to get around and the tour barnstormed through Adelaide, Tasmania, Melbourne, Sydney, provincial New South Wales, the Gold Coast, Cairns and Brisbane, virtually selling out everywhere. Their final show of the tour sold out the Sydney Entertainment Centre on August 10, 1985 was filmed and recorded for later release as The Live One.
To mark the 40th anniversary Dragon are touring extensively throughout Australasia which includes a 20 date tour of New Zealand in March. The current and longest living Dragon has been together since 2006 and is having more fun playing these great songs than it ever did.
