A few years
ago there was a regular Americana night just up the road from the venue from
where tonight’s gig is being held. RTM used to go there a lot in order to watch
something new and different. We saw bands like the Cash Brothers and Jolene who
came over from America to play a rocky sort of country music and we had some
good night’s there.
We found ourselves
thinking of those times while watching The Dreaming Spires. Ok, so the band is
from Oxford and not across the pond, but the music would have fitted in well.
The three piece feature two vocalists hamonising and are a very pleasant way to
spend half an hour. “Everything All The Time” is a lot catchier than its title
suggests, and while “Sin City” might put you in mind of Motley Crue it sounds
nothing like them. They also do a neat line in quirky, with “Not Every Song
From The 60s is a Classic” lives up to its fine name. Unexpectedly good.
Former
Green on Red frontman Chuck Prophet has re-invented himself as a fine
singer-songwriter and is one of those prolific people that rather like RTM
favourite Dan Baird, you suspect lives to make and play music. At the beginning
of this show though, he very nearly doesn’t play anything at all. After his
cover of Townes Van Zandt’s “Dollar Bill Blues” his guitar cuts out causing a
lengthy delay while things are fixed. If this creates a stop-start feel,
Prophet and his band are soon into their collective stride with “Credit” and “Doubter
Out Of Jesus,” both of which are excellent.
Prophet and
The Mission Express are in town for the first time in years to promote last year’s
brilliant “Temple Beautiful” album, its Stonsey title track is the perfect call
and response number, except for one thing, it contains the ridiculous lyric, “she
got so excited/Manchester United” and such things don’t go well in these parts.
No matter, though as the “…Beautiful” record is mined again for “Who Shot John”
with its languid Dylan type feel and “The Left Hand And The Right Hand” which
tells the tale of brothers that argue.
If this gig
was, for large parts, excellent, it wasn’t uniformly so. The sound problems
which affected the start return, which is coupled with the presence of Brummie music
stalwart Dave Cusworth in a rather, shall we say, tired and emotional state.
After initially greeting him warmly, Prophet visibly tires of the antics and
says “Dave, I got it from here, things can get pretty ugly pretty fast.”
Indeed,
that tetchiness seems to translate into the rest of the set, and Prophet does
seem slightly annoyed at the response from the crowd, telling us “The contract
says I have to play, in return you could look like you are enjoying it.” Things
reach their low point in set closer “You Did” which is rather self-angrandising
at the best of times, but the crowd is meant to join in. Most don’t and Prophet
looks none too pleased.
No matter,
he is soon back for “Tulane” by Chuck Berry, before ending with “Eight Miles
Low” by Cheap Trick which segues into a Doctor Feelgood song which is dedicated
to Wilko Johnson.
This was a
good, if overlong show, but one which you suspect that Chuck Prophet won’t
remember too fondly, as sound problems and a rather lacklustre, irritable
atmosphere stopped it from being totally memorable.
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