For Folk's Sake » Jay Jay Pistolet

Jay Jay Pistolet’s new band first track revealed

Lynn Roberts — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 16:07:48 +0000

Jay Jay Pistolet’s “new direction”, much speculated about since he hung up his acoustic guitar last year, was revealed recently. He’s the singer with new London-based rock ‘n’ rollers The Vaccines.

There’s not much info about the band to be found on their website. But if you like an arty photo or two, you’d be well advised to head over there.

We’ll keep the information coming as we have it, but in the meantime have a listen to their first song, If You Wanna. It’s already been given away on Lauren Laverne’s 6 Music show and lauded as ‘the hottest record in the world’ by Zane Lowe on Radio 1. We’re loathe to add to the hype, really, but it’s pretty good so we just have.

Album: Communion Compilation

Lynn Roberts — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 13:47:59 +0000

Look, the clue is in the name – this offering from the burgeoning club night established by Ben Lovett (Mumford & Sons) and Kevin Jones (Cherbourg) is a bringing together of musical souls and a testament to the talent that thrills through the British folk scene and makes it the beautiful thing we all love and admire

And yet for all the talk of a community, perhaps then the most surprising thing about this album is the sheer diversity on offer. Johnny Flynn opens the album in a traditional vein that continues all the way through the hand claps of ‘Zion’ by William Stokes to Pete Roe’s comforting, worldly voice on ‘Bellina’. But then of course there is Jay Jay Pistolet, a relic from the age of the wireless and the Wurlitzer, with his delightful homage to Cole Porter, ‘Vintage Red’. ‘Sister’, modestly hidden away in the middle of the album, is yet another triumph from Mumford & Sons – the hum of the organ and choir of harmony behind moralising lyrics creating a feeling of reverence perfectly fitting for an album entitled Communion. ‘Hands in the Sink’ is the pure sweet symbolism you expect from Alessi’s Ark, and Elena Tonra, speaking bluntly for every girl with a crush on Peter Pan, along with Beans on Toast, bring an Antifolk feel to proceedings. And as if all that wasn’t enough, Peggy Sue and Broadcast 2000 amongst others depart further from folk tradition with wonky beats and disconcerting sounds thrashed out on an acoustic guitar.

Time was when you had to look far westwards, to Nevada City perhaps, to behold such a collective of talented individuals united by music and geography and creating something distinct and special. Now – and this is not without considerable thanks to nurturing nights such as Communion or generous artists like Laura Marling who use their own star appeal to shine a light on their friends’ talents – we don’t have to venture beyond our fair shores to discover something new and exciting. It’s all here, just waiting to be discovered.

Words: Lois Jeary

Communion tracklisting:

Johnny Flynn – ‘In The Honour Of Industry’
Jay Jay Pistolet – ‘Vintage Red’
Marcus Foster – ‘Circle In A Square’
William Stokes Feat. Marcus Mumford – ‘Zion’
Pete Roe – ‘Bellina’
Broadcast 2000 – ‘That Sinking Feeling’
Benjamin Francis Leftwich – ‘More Than Letters
Jeremy Warmsley – ‘How We Became
Brendan Campbell – ‘Maudlin Reverie’
Alessi’s Ark – ‘Hands In The Sink
Mumford And Sons – ‘Sister’
Matthew And The Atlas – ‘Deadwood’
Alan Pownall – ‘Take Me’
Elena Tonra – ‘Peter’
Beans On Toast – ‘Things To Do Before You’re Thirty’
Kurran And The Wolfnotes – ‘Pounding’
Peggy Sue – ‘February Snow’
Andrew Davie – ‘Lie Down In The Blood’
Rachel Sermanni – ‘My Friend Fire’
Jesse Quin And The Mets – ‘The Sculptor And The Stone’
Matt Corby – ‘Light Home’

Communion to release compilation album featuring Mumford & Sons, Alessi + Australian show

Lynn Roberts — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 11:13:56 +0000

Communion, the London, Leeds and Brighton clubnight run by Ben Lovett of Mumford and Sons and Kev Jones, formerly of Cherbourg, will be releasing a 21-track compilation CD featuring Mumford and Sons, Johnny Flynn, Broadcast 2000, Alessi’s Ark and Jay Jay Pistolet.

The album will be released on 1st March on limited edition double gatefold vinyl as well as download. You can reserve your vinyl copy on the Communion website now.

As well as the more established artists, it features tracks from the lesser-known members of the folk community such as Laura Marling pianist Pete Roe, newcomer Benjamin Francis Leftwich and big-in-the-States Marcus Foster.

Kev Jones said: “What’s fascinating is you can hear the influence of artists such as Laura Marling, Noah And The Whale and Mumford and Sons filtering down into the newer artists and also cross-referencing each other along the way.”

Communion is held at Notting Hill Arts Club, London, The Adelphi, Leeds and The Albert, Brighton. While Ben is in Australia with Mumford and Sons and Laura Marling, they will be putting on Communion’s first ever antipodean event in Sydney on 27th Jan. For more details and upcoming shows, checkout the Communion MySpace.

Tracklisting:
Johnny Flynn – ‘In The Honour Of Industry’
Jay Jay Pistolet – ‘Vintage Red’
Marcus Foster – ‘Circle In A Square’
William Stokes Feat. Marcus Mumford – ‘Zion’
Pete Roe – ‘Bellina’
Broadcast 2000 – ‘That Sinking Feeling’
Benjamin Francis Leftwich – ‘More Than Letters
Jeremy Warmsley – ‘How We Became
Brendan Campbell – ‘Maudlin Reverie’
Alessi’s Ark – ‘Hands In The Sink
Mumford And Sons – ‘Sister’
Matthew And The Atlas – ‘Deadwood’
Alan Pownall – ‘Take Me’
Elena Tonra – ‘Peter’
Beans On Toast – ‘Things To Do Before You’re Thirty’
Kurran And The Wolfnotes – ‘Pounding’
Peggy Sue – ‘February Snow’
Andrew Davie – ‘Lie Down In The Blood’
Rachel Sermanni – ‘My Friend Fire’
Jesse Quin And The Mets – ‘The Sculptor And The Stone’
Matt Corby – ‘Light Home’

Words: Lynn Roberts

Jay Jay Pistolet offers 25-track ‘Goodbye CD’

Lynn Roberts — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:28:59 +0000

Justin Hayward-Young, who has hung up the moniker Jay Jay Pistolet in favour of a mysterious new musical direction (as reported here), is selling a 25-track album of JJP recordings for £5 through his MySpace.

He said: “Loads of people have been asking for CDs… think of it as a leaving present. Lots of old, new and unreleased tracks.”

Tracklisting
1. Bottom Of The Sea
2. Happy Birthday You
3. Bags Of Gold
4. Vintage Red
5. Friend, We Weren’t Even Lovers
6. We Are Free
7. Saint Michel
8. Let Them Grow
9. I Can’t Let Go
10. The Secrecy Of Mon Amie
11. Hooked Up On Us (Piano Version)
12. Come On
13. To Be Young Again
14. Oh Caroline
15. I Am Always On My Way Back Home
16. Holly (Demo Version)
17. Postmodern Blues
18. Constantly, Apparently
19. Emily’s Book
20. True Love Will Find You In The End (Daniel Johnston Cover)
21. Bags Of Gold (Kissy Sellout Remix)
22. Green & Brown & Blue (Live)
23. Where Does She Go When She Leaves Me?
24. Hooked Up On Us
25. Song For A Best Friend

We’re no businesspeople here at FFS, but it sounds like a smashing deal to us.

Words: Lynn Roberts

Jay Jay Pistolet calls it a day

Lynn Roberts — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 08:56:21 +0000

It seems Jay Jay Pistolet’s claims at the Cargo folky extravaganza Fee Fie Foe Fum last December that it was the last time he’d ever play his songs weren’t far from the truth. (See Anika’s words and pictures about the evening here)

The heart-on-sleeve troubadour — whose friends know him as Justin Hayward-Young — has announced on his MySpace that he’s hanging up his acoustic guitar in favour of a new musical direction.

He said:”Since my last blog a lot has changed. It’s been a frustrating summer.

“For now, I’m laying down my acoustic guitar. That is to say, I will not be playing shows or releasing material as Jay Jay Pistolet in the near future. Change is upon us but death is not. I’ll be back. For now though I’m concentrating on a new musical project that will take me in an entirely new direction. I’m incredibly excited. Stay tuned…”

But all is not lost JJP fans, Justin has uploaded some songs to his MySpace, and promises more: “For now, I’ve uploaded some of my favourite songs onto my Myspace page. some new, some old and some unheard. I continue to record at home so expect more in the coming days and weeks. Most will be available to download.”

FFS wishes Justin all the best with the new direction — although we were big fans of the old one — and we’re looking forward to hearing these new songs…

Words: Lynn Roberts

Noah and the Whale gig now half price, Jay Jay Pistolet to support + album news

Helen True — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:07:18 +0000

Noah and the Whale’s top secret ‘hidden’ gig on the behalf of Crisis, a homeless charity takes place this Wednesday. Well, it was top-secret until today, but now we can tell you it’s at the Roundhouse.

Support will be expertly provided by Wave Machines, Jay Jay Pistolet, Planet Earth and Rachel Mayfield.

Half price tickets (that would be £10 if not for all the booking and transaction fee palaver, which takes it up to nearly £15…) available here.

Ubiquitous irritant Zane Lowe has given Noah and the Whale the incredible honour of dubbing their new single, ‘Blue Skies’ “hottest record in the world for June 22 2009. Lofty praise indeed. He’s also made it available to listen to though, which you can do here.

This song for the bed-ridden and heart-broken will make more sense, we are told, in the context of Fink and Co’s new album, First Day of Spring, and the film that accompanies it. The title track is also available as a free download on Noah and the Whale’s website.

The album, which is due for release on 31st August, is available to pre-order now, and the partner film will be popping up in festival cinema tents this summer before a short run in proper cinemas, and will also be available to purchase with the album in a “deluxe box set”.

My, these whales have been busy.

Words: Helen True

Update: There will be a limited number of tickets available on the door tonight , so impulse Whale-watching is an option.

Communion hosts folktastic stage at Bloom festival

Lynn Roberts — Tue, 26 May 2009 20:43:29 +0000

Communion has announced a corker of a line-up for its first dalliance in festivals. The London – and now Brighton – night organised by Kev Jones of Cherbourg and Ben Lovett of Mumford and Sons, has curated a folk stage at Bloom in Bristol.

The LINE UP OF WONDER, as we have taken to calling it, includes FFS interviewees Cherbourg, Johnny Flynn, Emmy the Great, Alessi’s Ark, Jay Jay Pistolet, Broadcast 2000, Ryan O’Reilly and Kurran and the Wolfnotes.

There are also people we’d jolly well like to speak to like Fanfarlo, James Yuill, The Leisure Society, King Charles, Alan Pownall, Sam Beer, Pete Rowe, Jamie Woon, You and Me and Lights.

As if that’s not enough, Noah and the Whale will be playing the main stage and there’s organic yumminess, cocktails and – should you have a moment to spare – kitch activities like learning to knit and burlesque striptease.

The festival takes place on the weekend of the 15th August near Bristol. We’ve written about it before here. Tickets are £75, which makes Glastonbury look redic. And we don’t even like Crosby Stills and Nash or Neil Young anyway.*

What we’re trying to say is it’s going to be really very good and we suggest you click on the massive picture link below and get yourself a ticket pronto.

Words: Lynn Roberts

*lie

For Folk’s Sake Interview: Jeremy Warmsley

Lynn Roberts — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 13:00:57 +0000

For Folk’s Sake: So you just got back from a ukelele festival. What was that all about?

Jeremy Warmsley: A friend of mine is a promoter in Manchester and he put on a ukelele festival – it’s pretty much as straightforward as it sounds. I played, along with a band called Meursalt, Sparky Deathcap, Kathryn Edwards and Jam on Bread. Meursalt’s a Scottish Band and they’re quite big on the blog scene. Unfortunately I didn’t catch their set but I did see Sparky Deathcap – I’ve come across him before. He played in Daniel Johnston’s band at the Union Chapel last year. Anyway he had written a rock opera on the ukelele specially for the event.

That sounds brilliant.

Yeah it was incredible. It was about a guy who drives a van that delivers frozen organs to hospitals, and he gets caught in a town by a snow drift and meets a girl and falls in love with her. It’s pretty awesome. He had a projector and he projected drawings he’d done while he was playing.

So it was a good weekend?

It was actually only one night. There were about 70 people there for the day and it was really chilled out. Mushaboom promoters do a lot of good stuff in Manchester.

Last weekend was your Heartbreak Ball at the Slaughtered Lamb. Did you make the cupcakes yourself?

No, my girlfriend made the first batch of cupcakes, and then one of the people came along saw that I’d said there’d be cupcakes and made a batch too which was really amazing, and my bassist’s girlfriend brought her birthday cake.

Great, so now we’ve cleared that up, how did you feel about the gig?

Yeah, the gig was just great. I think Gossamer Albatross, Slow Club and Stars of Sunday League each played the best gig of theirs that I’d seen. They were all great performances. Johnny was great as well, playing on his own. I think people seemed to really enjoy the day. Loads of people were saying they were hoping we’d do it again next year.

In the past you were involved in putting together Songs in the Dark – first in Cambridge, then in London. Can you tell us a bit about that?

I did that with my friend Simon, who’s in a band called The Woebetides, and it started off because we wanted a platform – a regular place we could play that wasn’t an open mic night, and we could get on people we knew who we thought were talented. It was very studenty – lots of pretentious poetry, comedy acts. It was really nice, and we carried on doing it for about a year after we left uni. That was such early days – I think the only song of mine that dates back that far is “Five Verses”.

Has anyone who played at Songs in the Dark gone on to do well?

When we took it to London Emmy (the Great) played a night, and so did Johnny (Flynn). So did Jamie T, and Jack Peñate. Simon still puts it on in London, and it’s doing quite well, but when I was still involved in putting it on we’d just moved to London and we didn’t know anyone. It was so different to doing it as part of the student community.

So with Songs in the Dark, and the Heartbreak Ball, and your “New Thing” video show online, you seem to like showcasing music. Why is that?

It’s just something that seems to have happened quite naturally. I’m not trying to set myself up as some kind of svengali, I just enjoy seeing other people perform. I also do a lot of production stuff, like I produced some stuff with Gossamer Albatross and I’ve been working a bit with Jay Jay Pistolet. I’d say that’s much more important to me than this idea of being a channel to present stuff. It’s just good fun. I like the idea of making little obscure videos of people playing in slightly odd places, and if I’m doing that it makes sense to get a few people together rather than just making it a massive ego trip.

Maybe every month or so I go on MySpace and go through all my friend requests from bands, and it’s amazing how many really, really good musicians out there who will probably never get a chance. They’re lost out on the information super highway.

So your second album, How We Became, came out last September, and you released “If He Breaks Your Heart” as a single last weekend. What’s next? Can you tell us anything about this elusive ‘lost album’?

That’s actually what I’m kind of working on at the moment. Basically two years ago I wrote this thing, it’s 25 minutes long and I suppose it’s really one continuous piece of music split into six different things. I suppose it’s basically a rock opera, or something. That sounds really horrible and pretentious but it’s not. It’s doesn’t overstay its welcome. It’s basically just a narrative song that happens to be several tracks rather than a short story, and it’s about two kids who find a magic world in their back garden in classic children’s adventure style, but it gets a bit deeper than that. So I wrote that and demoed it, but I never really got a chance to finish it off and now I’ve got a bit of time so I’m going to finish it, and then decide what to do with it. I’ve got the next album to think about, so it might be part of that, or it might not. I don’t want to say anything for sure at the moment.

I’ve kind of got a lot of different strands of what I do as a musician. I’ve got the folky side, the indie-rock side, the electronic side, the orchestral side, and I want to stop trying to do it all at once – I’m going to try to focus on making things a bit more coherent rather than everything being mashed together.

One of the interesting things about both your albums is how varied the songs are – both in style and subject matter.

Yeah, and I think it’s great to have range, but when I think of my favourite artists they developed that range over the course of a career rather than doing it in the course of one album. If you think of an album like Harvest by Neil Young, that’s a mix of acoustic songs, electronic songs and orchestral songs all on it at once, and you know that’s a great album, but it’s not as good as, say, Nebraska by Bruce Springsteen, which is pretty much the same the whole way through the album. I think if you focus on just doing one thing really well you’re going to get a lot better than doing a whole bunch of different crazy things.

Do you think perhaps your impulse to mix together a whole bunch of styles comes from your excitement about all the different kinds of great music there are?

Exactly. I sat down, and I wrote what I thought was going to be my third album, which is much more concentrated and considered – it’s basically my guitar album – guitars, rock and roll. I played a couple of songs from it at the Heartbreak Ball. That might be my third album, or I might do something else. I’ve got lots of side projects on the go as well. I’ve kind of put a band together called Little Words, which is kind of west coast harmonies – that kind of acoustic – much more song-based, which we might start writing some songs for. We’ve been doing some covers things – we’ve done a Magnetic Fields thing, and we did a Tom Waits and Daniel Johnston night as well.

And then I’m working with my friend Tom Rogerson from Three Trapped Tigers, who used to play piano in my band – he plays on my album too, and he co-produced Emmy the Great’s album. Three Trapped Tigers are an amazing rock band – they’re really heavy actually, but also very melodic and beautiful. Anyway Tom and I have a side project called Green Lights Mean Go which will hopefully release something this year. We’ve got about two thirds of an album written.

So lots of stuff is waiting in the wings then?

JW: Yeah exactly. I kind of feel I’d like to do something a bit different to just pumping out a bunch more songs. I’ve been working pretty solidly as ‘Jeremy Warmsley’ for about five years now, and it’d be nice to think about something else a little bit.

So a question about your ‘process’ now, how do your songs get written?

In as much as I have a method, which is to say that every song is different and there are always exceptions, not quite a majority of my songs are written in the same way. That is, whenever I’m walking around and thinking about things, as most people do when they’re walking around, or sitting on the tube or whatever, or just having some quiet time, I’m always kind of looking at what I’m thinking, and saying ‘would that work in a song?’ on a second-order level. That’s a bit sad really – it’d be nice to have some thoughts that aren’t being debased by my creative direction. But if I have a thought of something that might work in a song then I make a little note of it, and then maybe every month or so I’ll sit down with a big list of ideas, and I’ll have a look at them and choose a couple and just fiddle about with them with a guitar and a piano until I have something resembling a song.

I don’t ever have any problems generating music. It’s the lyrics, and the idea of what the song’s going to be about which is really the crucial thing. The hard thing is to think of what’s a good subject for a song, from there the process of converting the idea to a bunch of lyrics is pretty straightforward really. You just think of some interesting ways of saying whatever you’re trying to say.

Emmy the Great has said in an interview that it’s kind of like doing a crossword – you find a couple of lines, like answers, but you have to work out how to make those fit in with the whole. Is it like that?

There’s this fantastic book by a guy called Keith Johnstone called “Impro”, which is about teaching people how to be creative again after they’ve forgotten how. As a child everyone’s really creative – making up stories and drawing pictures, and one of the things school does is teach you to stop doing that so that you can be a hard-working, useful member of society instead of daydreaming about robots all day. And in the book he says that one way of getting people to become creative again is just to give them three images and tell them to connect those images into a story, and that’s sometimes what writing a song is like. You have a line, and then you think of something that rhymes with that line, and these two lines are related in some way, and you have to think ‘these two lines are both related, and both sound good, what song would they make sense in?’

Sometimes you build the meaning of the song out of the actual lyrics, and sometimes you have the meaning first then you generate the lyrics, which is a much easier way to work, but sometimes it just fun to have a good line, and have another good line, and think of a bunch of other good lines that all turn into a good song. Hopefully.

I’ve been thinking about this recently, so I’m not sure all my songs would stand up to this kind of analysis, but every single line of a song should just be pure gold. If you look at a Leonard Cohen song, every single lyric could be used as the header for people’s blogs about how their girlfriend has dumped them or whatever, which I think is a good balance.

Have you got any big trips planned this year?

I’m going to Germany in April, and hopefully Spain and Italy shortly after which will be great. I’ve never really toured Europe so I’m really looking forward to that. I did Japan last December, which was just phenomenal. Actually, I’m going to put in a little plug for a restaurant in London called Abeno. There’s one on New Museum Street, and there’s one by Leicester Square, and they sell a kind of food called okonomiyaki, which is a staple in Japan but it’s the only restaurant in Europe that actually serves it. It’s a kind of savoury pancake with bits of shrimp or tofu or whatever you want in it, and it’s just absolutely extraordinary. They cook it for you in front of you on this metal plate thing and it’s really delicious and unusual. Basically I want them to become really massive so that they open a massive chain and they’ll have one in every city in the world, and then when I’m on tour I can have okonomiyaki every night. It’s really cheap as well.

Great, we’ll give it a try. Back to music, when did you decide this was the career for you?

JW: I started writing songs quite late, and I got into music quite late – I was 16 or 17 and I just became completely possessed by it. I didn’t really spend any time thinking about or doing anything else. I kind of fell into going to uni. I really like that expression – over the weekend people kept telling me that they’d ‘fallen into’ really interesting jobs. How do you fall into being someone who moves art around for a living? So anyway I fell into going to uni pretty much by accident, and really spent a lot more time playing music at uni than working on uni stuff. I think like most people who love what they do, I’ve never really sat down and thought about whether doing this for a living is a sensible thing. It was never really a conscious decision, I just spent all my time doing it, and if you spend ten hours a day doing something, probably after a while you’re going to fall into a way of making a living out of it. If I wasn’t making music and playing music I’d probably make a living teaching it, or playing in other people’s bands, or producing it.

And finally do you have any recommendations for FFS readers?

New stuff?

Well, you can talk about other stuff if you like.

I’m really excited about the new Grizzly Bear record. I guess, new bands that haven’t really hit the public eye yet that I like: Gossamer Albatross, Three Trapped Tigers, Woebetides, all the band I’ve mentioned and all the bands that played at Heartbreak Ball (Stars of Sunday League, Slow Club, Johnny Flynn). There’s a band called Mitchell Museum in Glasgow who I think are just signing their first record deal. They’re absolutely extraordinary. They play amazing day-glo pop tunes.

I listen to a lot of Radio 3. It’s the only music station that doesn’t really offend on a regular basis, and they have a programme called the Late Junction where they play experimental music. They played someone on David Sylvian’s label called Thomas Feiner who’s absolutely phenomenal. It’s kind of like early Scott Walker before he went weird, but, a bit weird. It’s hard to describe it.

I listened to a lot of John Fahey on the coach today. He’s a 50s/60s experimental fingerpicking guitarist. The first time you listen to it you think ‘what’s this country bullshit?’ then you realise it sounds like there’s three guitars playing, but there’s not, there’s just one. He does really amazing melodies and ridiculous, convoluted constructions. I think he’s a big influence on the way Johnny (Flynn) plays guitar actually. I was listening to it today with that in mind. That’s it, I think.

Well that’s certainly a good selection for people to look into. Is there anything else you’re up to that you’d like people to know about?

Just one thing actually, it’s not on MySpace yet but I’m playing a gig with the Bobby McGees in Stoke Newington on March 28th. It’s at Barden’s Boudoir and I’m quite excited about it.

Interview: Helen True

Jay Jay Pistolet to support Noah and the Whale on UK tour

Lynn Roberts — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 10:17:05 +0000

Jay Jay Pistolet has been confirmed as support for Noah and the Whale on their springtime UK tour.

The run takes in 10 UK dates in March and will feature a compere, projections, film and illusions, as well as the usual folk’n'roll.

M. Pistolet, or Justin to his friends, announced at the Fie Fie Foe Fum Cargo show that it was the last time he would be playing his old songs. When FFS caught up with him at Cherbourg’s EP launch last week he denied that it was an empty threat to shut the audience up, so we’re looking forward to some brand spanking new material.

The Noah and the Whale/Jay Jay show dubbed the ‘Club Silencio’ tour, will call at the following lucky venues:

5/3 – Norwich, UEA
6/3 – London, Shepherds Bush Empire
7/3 – Brighton, St George’s Church
8/3 – Manchester, Academy 2
10/3 – Gateshead, The Sage
11/3 – Edinburgh, Queens Hall
12/3 – Leeds, Metropolitan University
13/3 – Birmingham, Town Hall
15/3 – Bristol, Academy
16/3 – Nottingham, Trent University

Words: Lynn Roberts

Live review: Laura Marling supported by Jay Jay Pistolet @ The Scala, London

Lynn Roberts — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 14:14:09 +0000

Arriving half way through Pete’s Roe’s set at the already incredibly crowded Scala on Tuesday, the excitement in the air was palpable. This was The Night Terror Tour’s homecoming and, after a brief trip around the UK and a longer one around the US with Mumford and Sons and Johnny Flynn, Laura Marling was back where it all began.

Support came from For Folk’s Sake favourite Jay Jay Pistolet who quickly launched into his opener Always On My Way Back Home. Only those who were there to witness the formerly frenetic atmosphere could understand what a coup it was that silence descended.

M. Pistolet brought on backing musicians for EP title track Happy Birthday You who, if anything, made his ethereal retro sound even more sparse. His set included two as-yet-unnamed new tracks, one of which contained the line ‘You were Blonde on Blonde but a whole lot better,’ which FFS thinks is about the nicest compliment a person could pay.

The capacity crowd were enthralled throughout, and Jay Jay clearly appreciated it, thanking the audience repeatedly for being ‘polite’ and ‘kind’. But that wasn’t kindness, it was awe.

Laura Marling’s new-song heavy setlist went down well with the notoriously old-song-favouring gig-goers. She played choice tracks from Alas I Cannot Swim: including Cross Your Fingers, a raucous version of You’re No God, and Ghosts, which raised an almighty cheer from the lumberjack-shirt-clad crowd.

Marling’s backing band, in an abundance of tweed and tartan, was noticeably missing Marcus Mumford and Ted Dwane from Mumford and Sons on percussion and double bass, something Laura alluded to in one of her tentative attempts at on-stage banter. The pair have been replaced by Graham Ross on bass and Dave Sanderson on drums.

Among the highlights of the show for this reviewer were Phil Fiddle’s haunting violin solo on Night Terror and the closing song Alas I Cannot Swim, which turned into a full on Hoe down. But it’s Laura’s new material that is really exciting, songs such as Rambling Man and Rebecca – often played live but not yet released – suggest that, astonishingly, the best may still be to come.

Words: Lynn Roberts

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