Craig Fuller, son Patrick visit Indy Acoustic Cafe Series

Anyone who enjoyed and/or remembers pop music in the 1970s and '80s surely was touched at some point by Craig Fuller. He founded the country-rock band Pure Prairie League, which had 1970s hits in "Aime" and "Let Me Love You Tonight." In recent years, Pure Prairie League has reformed with Fuller at the helm again. In the late '80s and early '90s, Fuller fronted the reassembled band Little Feat, which had gone on a lengthy hiatus after the death of the band's co-founder Lowell George in 1979.

Fuller helped restore Little Feat's position among rock's echelon. He was the force behind three attention-grabbing Little Feat albums, "Let It Roll," "Representing the Mambo" and "Shake Me Up."

Fuller went on to other projects through the years, and now is touring as an acoustic act with his son Patrick. The two of them performed Saturday at the Wheeler Arts Community Center in the Fountain Square cultural district of Indianapolis to deliver a delightful show as part of the long-running Indy Acoustic Cafe Series.

Fuller dipped sparingly into his Pure Prairie League and Little Feat repertoire; I was most impressed when he performed a Tom Rush song -- "No Regrets" -- that Fuller said he felt had gone grossly underappreciated over the years, and I agree. Rush released the melancholy "love lost" song "No Regrets" from the early 1970s as the front, lyric portion of a two-part composition. It transitioned into a intriguing acoustic guitar solo romp called "Rockport Sunday." Fuller didn't do the latter, but he took a nice stab at the former.

Patrick Fuller dazzled as an instrumentalist and on several solo tunes during the show. His charm was contagious, delighting the nearly full house in attendance in the intimate theater.

Last up in the spring season of the series, on April 28, is Jonathan Edwards, who dented the Billboard charts with a hit single "Sunshine" in the early 1970s and has been enjoying a life of performing and farming in western Massachusetts ever since. Series manager Mark Butterfield said the fall season would begin Oct. 13 with a return visit by John Gorka. 

These pictures are from the Saturday show; a full gallery of images can be found at my Indy Acoustic Cafe Series folder at my online site.