Friday 21st April. The London Palladium. John Prine. It’s me and the twin towers tonight and we’re in for a real treat we hope. We have not seen John Prine live before and we have the added bonus of the talented Amanda Shires as support. I don’t think I have ever seen a gig at the London Palladium and I’m pretty sure the only time I have been to this theatre was when I was a kid to see a pantomime.

It’s a short opening set for Amanda but enough to showcase her talents as both a musician and a singer. Her crystal clear country voice fills the large room and I’m sure she has won over many new fans tonight. Her stories are warm, funny and engaging between songs mainly taken from her latest album ‘My Piece of Land’.

After beating cancer a few years ago Prine’s voice is a little deeper but any concerns we may have had about its strength were instantly dispelled as he delivered a near faultless display busting the venue curfew with a two hour show.

Strong of voice and their love of music, Prine and band are clearly having a blast on this tour. The set comes from throughout his extensive catalogue although a third of it is from the classic self-titled debut album. The band are tight and accompany Prine’s rhythm guitar effortlessly with a special mention for Pat McLaughlin on mandolin.

There’s a great solo spot where the band leave the stage leaving Prine to put the audience even more under his spell rattling through a few classics including the great ‘Sam Stone’. He crams in a few extra songs I think, before ushering the band and Amanda Shires back on stage where she accompanies on fiddle and vocals with him on several tracks from his most recent duets album ‘For Better, or worse’.

It’s soon eleven o’clock and with both the crowd and band wanting to carry on the venue gestapo call time on a truly wonderful night of music. Highlights too many to mention but props to ‘Lake Marie’ and ‘Souvenirs’.

Keep on country rockin y’all.
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Wednesday 5th April. Bush Hall, London. Alejandro Escovedo. It’s been fifteen years since I last saw Alejandro Escovedo at the Borderline way back in 02. Not a regular visitor to these shores we weren’t going to miss this opportunity to see him again especially with a full band. Of the band he only met this fine bunch of Italian musicians a few weeks ago and they are accompanying him throughout his extensive European tour.

Whilst ostensibly touring in support of his fine current album ‘Burn Something Beautiful’ the set is drawn from across his extensive back catalogue. It’s a good mix up of rock, punk and acoustic moments with Escovedo effortlessly switching between. Just don’t call it Americana. Whilst he eschews the label Americana to categorise his style of music over the past twenty years I still think it fits.

What he does bring are his roots of punk to the proceedings and when the band rock they really rock and the talented Antonio Gramentieri from the support band Don Antonio ably provides the licks to Escovedo’s rhythm.

There a number of influences on display tonight especially from these isles with the likes of T Rex and even an appearance of John Perry from the Only Ones during the encore. Consider the band have been together less than a month the sound is tight and they don’t miss a beat.

On a night of many highlights stand outs for me were the rockin ‘Castanets’ and I had a soft spot for ‘Sally was a Cop’ since it came out.

Again Bush Hall delivers with a great concert and it really is the best venue of its size in London. A brilliant night of music and let’s hope Mr E doesn’t leave it so long till he returns to these shores. (Acoustic tent at Glastonbury please).

Without wanting to categorise keep on folk, country, Americana, punk rockin’ y’all.​