Category: Gigs

Live | Lissie @ KOKO, London

The last time I saw Lissie play it was a dreary Tuesday night in Dingwalls some three and half years ago. I was pretty disappointed about a pretty dismal gig. This Tuesday night, also in Camden (but KOKO, a much…

Live | Teenage Fanclub @ The Institute, Birmingham

Twenty-five years ago Teenage Fanclub played this same Digbeth venue, days before the release of their breakthrough album Bandwagonesque. Granted, their fringes were longer and frames looser-limbed but close your eyes and not much has changed. Grunge, Britpop and lesser…

James Bay @ The Slaughtered Lamb, London

On the 25th November 2013, London-based record label and gig promoter Communion put on a gig in the basement of the Slaughtered Lamb pub, Clerkenwell. Headlining for the first time was a young man called James Bay. Tonight, three years…

Live | Rachael Yamagata @ The Islington, London

I first came across Rachael Yamagata a few years ago, through a Noisetrade sampler. I was into American girls with guitars at the time, so I downloaded. I listened. I deleted. “Vanilla,” I thought – there was nothing there to…

Live | This Is The Kit @ Trinity Church, Bristol

The stage is crowded like a primary school nativity play where every kid has necessarily been given a role. It’s the culmination of a celebratory night of revolving cast members and cameos, with This Is The Kit beginning their final…

Live | Loudon Wainwright III @ St George’s Hall, Bristol

Folk royalty, that’s what Loudon Wainwright III is. As the father of musicians Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright and Lucy Wainwright Roche and former husband of the late folksinger Kate McGarrigle, he has musical pedigree. Like Red Rum with a banjo.…

Live | John Carpenter @ Brighton Dome

In that special late October lull when the days gather a brooding scowl, the evenings swell and the landscape outside of town waits with electric expectation for the spectral touch of Halloween, a cold breeze skits the fallen leaves and…

Live | Lisa Hannigan @ Islington Assembly Hall, London

On Monday 24 October, the Islington Assembly Hall welcomed Lisa Hannigan and her band, touring to promote her long-awaited new album At Swim. By 8pm, the hall was already filling up. First on stage was Portland singer/songwriter Heather Woods Broderick,…

Live | Tom Brosseau @ The Albion Beatnik, Oxford

Space, place, and time clearly matter to Tom Brosseau. That is why the Albion Beatnik was a fitting space for his thoughtful and gentle performance on the 22nd of October. The Oxford bookstore describes itself as “enthusiastic” and “eclectic”, and…