Gigging Guide...
Mar. 29th, 2008 01:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
f4f3Two gigs this week, proving that I iz down wif the yoof, innit.
Although, since neither of the headliners were south of forty, not terribly yoof-full.
Kathryn Williams and Neil MacColl put on a great show, warm and intimate (unlike the venue - I can't help hoping that the Classic Grand was better heated in its last incarnation as a porno cincema). Well crafted songs, great muscianship, and, as I say, warm and intimate. I only connected emotionally with a couple of the songs - the encores of Hallelujah and Beautiful Cosmos and one of the new tracks, Come With Me. A really enjoyable evening. The least said about the support, the better. Except maybe to say that if you begin a song about relationships with a line about black holes, you better be smiling. She wasn't.
Last night was Martin Stephenson at the Tron. Since I was last there they've made a little performance space in the foyer, with an accoustic stage. I'd say there were 100 people there, which made it fairly packed, all seated. And quite a lot tanked up too - Martin came on around 10.30 or so, and some of the punters had obviously been drinking for a few hours.
I've seen Martin half a dozen times or so over the last 20 years, in venues as diverse as the Royal Concert Hall, King Tuts and an arts centre in Gateshead. In every place he's weighed up the audience in five minutes or so, and matched his performance to the place. Last night was a brilliant example of that - I've never seen a place in such an uproar. Heckling, whistling accompanists , call and response lines - it was absolutely riotous from start to finish. And given that he started with two songs written for people who'd taken their own lives and finished with "Little Red Bottle", his song about alcoholism, and "Home", the poem he wrote for his mother the day she died, it covered a lot of emotional ground.
The gig finished well after midnight, and everyone, drunks, folkies, aging punks and musos went home very happily indeed.
Although, since neither of the headliners were south of forty, not terribly yoof-full.
Kathryn Williams and Neil MacColl put on a great show, warm and intimate (unlike the venue - I can't help hoping that the Classic Grand was better heated in its last incarnation as a porno cincema). Well crafted songs, great muscianship, and, as I say, warm and intimate. I only connected emotionally with a couple of the songs - the encores of Hallelujah and Beautiful Cosmos and one of the new tracks, Come With Me. A really enjoyable evening. The least said about the support, the better. Except maybe to say that if you begin a song about relationships with a line about black holes, you better be smiling. She wasn't.
Last night was Martin Stephenson at the Tron. Since I was last there they've made a little performance space in the foyer, with an accoustic stage. I'd say there were 100 people there, which made it fairly packed, all seated. And quite a lot tanked up too - Martin came on around 10.30 or so, and some of the punters had obviously been drinking for a few hours.
I've seen Martin half a dozen times or so over the last 20 years, in venues as diverse as the Royal Concert Hall, King Tuts and an arts centre in Gateshead. In every place he's weighed up the audience in five minutes or so, and matched his performance to the place. Last night was a brilliant example of that - I've never seen a place in such an uproar. Heckling, whistling accompanists , call and response lines - it was absolutely riotous from start to finish. And given that he started with two songs written for people who'd taken their own lives and finished with "Little Red Bottle", his song about alcoholism, and "Home", the poem he wrote for his mother the day she died, it covered a lot of emotional ground.
The gig finished well after midnight, and everyone, drunks, folkies, aging punks and musos went home very happily indeed.
