Josienne Clarke at the Hug & Pint - a story of storms, sad songs and the reasons for the same

 

You wait for a singer to play somewhere near you and they set a date and of course you get your ticket. The much anticipated day arrives but the weather makes you think twice. It's really bad, though maybe you're a wuss. You decide not to go. And that could have been the end of this story. But then this happened - the singer posts on social media that she's arrived in Glasgow after a ferry journey from Bute and a drive through awful weather - she did write a song titled '(Learning to Sail) In All Weather' after all.

So that profound challenge and an obvious change in the weather saw me depart westwards for the customary getting lost within yards of the venue followed by a chickpea korma with my friend Stewart before the show I was there ready to see Josienne Clarke after years of listening to her music and the occasional interaction on social media.

 Alone centre stage Josienne held the audience in the palm of her hand. Despite a new album in the offing there was only one new song, the rest of the set spanned a selection from across her career. And what a a body of work from an artist who writes lines like 'make your peace with failure/a lesson that you learned' and 'you sing and play and make things/for that is all you can do'. These lines come from 'Chicago' a song born of the disaster of turning up in that fabled city to play in an empty venue.

As a self declared miserabilist Josienne Clarke shows she also has a sense of humour with her between song banter and introductions. She frets that her sad songs are doing no good and might be making sad people sadder. That's probably a subject to discuss in a thesis but the evidence tonight would seem to counter that view as it appeared that these sad songs sung so beautifully made us, the audience, happy.

And there is the essence - the answer to the question do we need music, especially sad songs. Thank you Josienne the wait and the journey to hear you was worth it. More sad songs? Yes please.

https://josienneclarke.bandcamp.com/

Chicago Sun Times Melancholy is a Vocation in Itself

An Evening with Miss Margo Price

Oran Mor, Glasgow 24 January 2017

It was in either December 2015 or April 2016 that I first became aware of Margo Price the honky tonk country force of nature who is carving out a reputation as one of country music’s best new singer songwriters. I have her fellow contemporary country singer Caitlin Rose to thank for that introduction.

From the get go Margo’s honky tonk voice and songs reminded me of that pioneer woman country singer and songwriter Loretta Lynn. Both her voice and songs link directly back to that straight talking real life subjects and lyrics of Loretta. It is perhaps no surprise that Margo Price finds herself debut album released on Jack White’s Third Man Records – White produced and collaborated with Loretta Lynn on her ‘Van Lear Rose’ comeback in 2004.

Like Loretta the songs come from hard bitten experience and deal with the grittier side of life. This is not a moon in June, hearts and flowers songwriter. These are songs that are inspired by hard times, hard living, and redemption. Above all they are infused with her own life experience which thanks to the sheer quality of her songs connects with audiences because of the honesty of the tales they tell. The music harks back to classic country but serves up a bite often lacking from machine modern country.

I got hold of her album ‘Midwest Farmer’s Daughter’ as soon as it came out and it has been on my regular playlist ever since so when I heard she was making her first visit to Scotland to play as part of the annual Celtic Connections Festival getting tickets was a no brainer.

Live Margo Price and her band cook up full tilt honky tonk country rock’n’roll with a panache and warmth that connects straight to the audience.  Opening with ‘How the Mighty Have Fallen’, then taking the show through the many highlights of the album. Stand outs including ‘Hands of Time’, ‘Four Years of Chances’, ‘Weekender’ and ‘Hurtin’ on the Bottle’ adding covers of Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene’ and an inspired workout on Kris Kristofferson’s ‘Me and Bobby McGee’ Margo showed us all a great time.

She says it took her thirteen years to get to the point of releasing her debut album and on the strength of the new song she featured at Oran Mor ‘You Told me with Your Eyes’ and another new song not performed ‘All American Made’ she’s got more to share with her, rightly, growing audience.

As much as I’m looking forward to future recordings from Margo I can’t wait to catch her live again, real soon.

Find out more about Margo Price www.margoprice.net 

Listen to her session on KEXP https://youtu.be/iavwbKHAnYE