Vikki Clayton/Chris Conway

VIKKI CLAYTON/CHRIS CONWAY

Musician Pub: 31st August 2023

What an absolute treat of a gig at The Musician Pub Thursday night.

Starting with a solo set by Chris Conway. Chris is a multi instrumentalist with a great voice, always a joy to listen to, whether solo, in a duo or band. His performances are always warm, entertaining and full of interest. His songs, often quirky are always wonderful. Tonights performance was all of this... hugely entertaining and enjoyable.

Headliner tonight was Vikki Clayton, always a major figure especially in the folk field. Vikki is blessed with a lovely voice and sings beautifully. She is a warm relaxed and reassuring personality and manages to make the room feel like she is singing in her front room, clearly enjoying the performance throughout. She opened with an unaccompanied "Rising of the Moon" followed by a song by a friend in New Zealand then one of my favourite Richard Thompson songs, " Dimming of the Day" before inviting Chris back to the stage to finish the gig as a duo.

So They ran through a host of songs from Vikki’s repertoire as well as a few of Chris's songs and went together like bacon and eggs, or fish and chips... a perfect blend and two quality entertainers thriving on the buzz of playing and singing together...

As well as the songs we heard some entertaining patter shedding light on some of the songs and their background.

The set ended and the duo came back to finally close with Sandy's masterwork "Who Knows Where the Time Goes"

This was a special night in the company of two special entertainers... wonderful

Keep music live... keep music real....support your local venue

Kossoff

KOSSOFF/THE BAND PLAYS ON

Musician Pub: 30th August 2023

Welcome return to the The Musician Pub last night for the awesome KOSSOFF-THE BAND PLAYS ON. Dont be fooled into thinking of this band as "another tribute band"... this is a band of gifted musicians... Terry Slesser must be one of the best rock vocalists in the business.... John Buckton is a magnificent guitarist, and was first choice to replace Koss in the event of Free reforming. Bassist Rhino Edwards (Status Quo) and drummer Clive Edwards (UFO/Pat Travers) form an absolutely awesome rhythm section driving things along...

The repertoire is the music of the late great Paul Kossoff, and they opened with a powerful version of "The Stealer.".. and closed out with "Wishing Well", "Alright now" and the encore, almost inevitably, was "The Hunter". With a great many classic Free and Back Street Crawler tracks coming in between.

The band never fails... you know you will always get a full on performance, great music played brilliantly with energy and panache. The band build a great rapport with the audience and create a wonderful atmosphere.

Last nights show was everything you would expect... if you have seen the band before, you know exactly how good this was... if you haven't seen them... why not?? go see them...

Keep music live... keep music real... support your local venue

Firebug Bank Holiday All Day Festival

HONEST DAVE/CHRIS ILETT/DAVE MASSON/MOUSE TEETH/SOMETHING ORANGE/ALEXIS PRETORIUS/NEW AGE GRACE/AMY DX/PRODUKTY/THRILL CITY/TEIGER/ARMY OF SKANKS/MYSTERY ACTION/HEX POSEUR

Firebug 27th August 2023

What a great day at Firebug Venue, where we had wall to wall live music from midday to going on midnight. The main reason for me going was to see Amy Dx but looking at the whole bill i had to stay to the end... my apologies go to Steve Parker, Nour & Kenton Hall who i didnt get to see as i didnt arine til 2.30.

So what of the artists i did see... as there are 14 of them some will be reason of space be rather short reviews...

Firs tup was HONEST DAVE who played guitar and sang accompanied by lovely low-key saxophone from SHAZ COLLIER. Dave sang at tines in a reedy falsetto and at other times in a "normal" voice... and both were good. The songs were at times highly political, but all fine songs. The use of tape loops etc was i felt creative and i thoroughly enjoted the set

Then downstair for CHRIS ILETT... a good voice and good guitar player, but the songs, though individually fine, were rahter samey dealing in doomed relationships... a fairly routine singer/songwriter set but quite pleasant

The is was DAVE MASSON... playing electric, and playing it well, singing a selection of his own song... another singer/songwriter set with light and shade, and highly enjoyable

Back down to see MOUSE TEETH. who i had found rivetting when i first saw her a few weeks back, and todays show was no less rivetting. She performs songs and poetry, mainly very personal and often touching on her difficulties being a woman in a mans world. Really top class performance, really enjoyed it.

When you have a day seeing 14 different acts, there are bound to be some that you dont enjoy so much... that for me was SOMETHING ORANGE... I personally couldn't see where they were going and sorry... this one was not to my taste

So back to the lower venue for ALEXIS PRETORIUS... acoustic guitar singer songwriter with a beautiful delicate voice, but she showed later in the set she could comfortably handle (in her words) grungier delivery. Really enjoyed this, and love the flexibility of her voice, sweeping effortlessly up into the higher registers

Next up was a real revelation... NEW AGE GRACE rocked like crazy.. definite shades of a souped up Vinegar Joe (for anyone who remembers that far back)... Grace is a powerhouse rock sing and the band tight and really cooking... a terrific set of vintage rock music... loved them!!..., definitely one to keep an eye out for

Next up, AMY DX... and they absolutely smashed it... they have become a superb band, tight, musically terrificand hugely good to listen to. The key though is Amy and her superb voice delivering a rocking "Go your own way" along with her own song... all of which a top quality... If you haven't heard Amy's album, "Time".. do yourself a favour and get one!!

From there to PRODUKTY... the leader has a grerat rock voice and sings well, and musically they are very good. A fine solid rock performance

At this point technical issues threw the running order out, so next to play were THRILL CITY... A super group featuring a drummer from Crazyhead, guitarist from Zodiac Mindwarp and bass player from Gaye Bikers on Acid... and this was a real treat... a fabulous set of high octane sleazy rock'n'roll... great... highly recommended

We then had TEIGER... a really great set, fairly undefinable but probably prog!... laid back hollow electric guitar and vocals, dynamic bass and drums providing a hypnotic basis for the haunting vocals... excellent

After this, the ARMY OF SKANKS... a fun punk trio... excellent but if i have a complaint, maybe a bit too polite for the genre.. well worth seeing though.

Then on to the unique MYSTERY ACTION... saw them the day before as well... suffice it to say that as ever they delivered a truly great voodoo rock'n'roll show and were bloody great!

Ending the night, playing the lower venue, was the superb HEX POSEUR... this band is simply outstanding and joyfully delivered their customary set of vital, uplifting thrash... magnificent

Keep music live... keep music real... support your local venues