It’s the usual early show for a Friday night in London as music venues have a 10pm curfew to let the club crowd in. So it’s a very early start for us to get there in time to see Tommy Prine who delivers a perfect opening set full of autobiographical songs and provides an insight to his songwriting process. By that I mean looking around the room and using the titles of two books on his coffee table as the opening lines of a song. A great intro for the evening and note to self to buy his latest album.
Next up its Margo Price who hasn’t visited these shores for six long years where I saw her at Glasto rockin the Park Stage and a few months before that in Islington. She is over here for the Long Road festival so it was great that this intimate show could be shoe horned into the schedule.
It’s a six-piece band led by husband Jeremy Ivey, mainly on 12 string, two other guitarists, bass, keys and it was good to see a second drum kit for Margo set up to unleash a double barrelled skin beating assault. One thing was clear this was not going to be a soft acoustic country show and indeed it wasn’t. It was a good old-fashioned foot stompin full on country rock show.
As the band sets the scene Margo enters stage left in a flurry of frills and as entrances go it’s up there with Dwight Yoakam’s mirrored suit from a few years back. We are then straight into a storming version of ‘Been to the Mountain’ from the last album ‘Strays’. This kicks off the next ninety minutes of non-stop rocking action taking in tracks from across the back catalogue. There’s little time to breathe or for between song chat as, maybe because of the early curfew, we move seamlessly to the next song on the list.
The band are tight tonight and all members have ample space to shine with the rhythm section driving the beat along, the lead licks are shared around the guitarists with the keys adding even more depth to the overall sound.
It’s a superb show, full of energy, great songs coupled with that unique voice. Let’s hope we don’t have to wait another six years for a return to these shores.
Keep on country rockin’ y’all