2018 Gigs

Unless we have a future laced with good gigs we feel things aren’t quite right. This year we needed good gigs more than ever. In no particular order...

It was great to see Ralph McTell and Wizz Jones together - really low key, blues songs, covers, some McTell songs. Two great guitar players.

Chris Wood was on his own with his Epiphone - he has such a stature and presence these days, it reminds me a bit of Christy Moore. Great songs, great playing, great singing.

Chris and Mike went to see Sleeper’s last gig before they broke up, in Brixton Academy in the 90s. Louise Wener was very bitter with the music press. So it was lovely to see her enjoying herself and sounding as good as ever - maybe the archetypal ‘Britpop’ band?

Lucy Farrell, from the Furrow Collective is doing solo gigs these days - singing her unique and beautiful songs. Highly recommended.

We went to Folk By The Oak again this year, but unfortunately it was in the heat wave so we fried!  By the time Billy Bragg came on it was a bit cooler, and he was very good value - old and new songs alike.

We have seen Sam Carter as part of False Lights several times, but we also saw him alone this year for the first time. he is an amazing guitarist and singer, but also writes some very interesting songs.

False Lights are always good - they all look as if they’re enjoying themselves so much! Folk-rock is not dead!

We went to see the pianist Mitsuko Uchida at Peterhouse, and the programme said “NO COUGHING!”. Eek! Someone was frog-marched out the door.

Mystery Train played at the Girton College ‘Blues, Booze and Chocolate’ gig again. The poster says it is the 17th year! Can this really be true? We also played by request of the Mistress of Girton College, who wanted to expose her students to the songs of Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan. It all went very well, surprisingly, and I think the picture shows it.

On the classical front again, we saw the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra with their new conductor Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla (I’ve no idea how you pronounce that!). She was a breath of fresh air actually.

We went to see ‘Shake The Chains’ which was a  project set up to explore protest songs. They occasionally had guest artists and this time they had Grace Petrie and Leon Rosselson. If you don’t know Leon Rosselson, check him out on youTube or somewhere. Try ‘The World Turned Upside Down’.

At the Wickham Festival, near Dave and Clare, we saw Jon Boden, Richard Thompson, and Paul Jones. The woman next to Mike said of Mr. Jones,  “As far as I’m concerned he’s a god!”.

I’m running out of road. Leveret, Kate Rusby, Blowzabella, and many more...