The 1969 Show Featuring Abbey Road, St George’s Church, Brighton, May 12

The Argus Angel-winning Pet Sounds Vs Sgt Pepper show by Brighton Beach Boys has become something of an institution at the Fringe.

The 14-piece band has been recreating these two masterpieces for seven years, so it’s understandable they might want to widen their scope a little.

For this show they returned to The Beatles’s final album for the second time, and rather than accompany it with self-penned tunes, placed it in context with songs from the close of the “greatest decade in the history of mankind”, as Ralph Brown’s Danny famously described it in Withnail And I.

Their choices underlined the band’s versatility, from psychedelia to reggae to sci-fi with David Bowie’s Space Oddity, but it lacked some of the cohesion of the album shows.

The best song in the set was, perhaps unsurprisingly, The Beach Boys’s I Can Hear Music, showing off the band’s great vocal skills and Glen Richardson’s lead in particular.

A beautiful rendition of Nick Drake’s River Man, the plaintive nostalgia of Blackberry Way by The Move and the theme from Midnight Cowboy were also brilliant.

Elsewhere although musical director Steve Wrigley did a great Roger Daltrey on Pinball Wizard it didn’t quite lift off, and the same could be said for Jimi Hendrix’s Crosstown Traffic.

The second half was back on track, with Abbey Road’s closing 20-minute medley deservedly earning the band a standing ovation – particularly with an impressive change of drummers midway through The End’s solo.

It would be great if next year the band could find an album equal to go alongside Abbey Road – but then there aren’t many of those about. Perhaps it’s time to tackle Smile?

* The Brighton Beach Boys play the 1969 songs they couldn’t fit in the show in an acoustic style on Tuesday, May 22, at the Rock Inn, Rock Place, Brighton, as part of the £5 Fringe.