After a gargantuan wait, and it quickly becoming apparent that there'd only
be the one support band tonight, the lights went down, and to much applause,
Mr Hudson and the Library, came to the stage.
Dressed in clothes that were reminiscent of 1950's Chicago gangster scenes,
Mr Hudson introduced himself, and his library, and the music began. The
five piece consist of vocals, with occasional acoustic guitar, bass guitar,
steel pan drums, electric drums, and piano. Their sound is very easy going,
quite jazzy and laid back, but with a somewhat more modern style of vocal
over the top. I don't think there's anyone who can find this music bad
to listen to, it's just so, inoffensive and foot-tappingly good.
They opened with "One Specific Thing," which uses (like a few
of their songs,) the piano and steel pan drums, synchronised, playing
the same melody, which actually created a great sound. It's just like
a steel pan drum, but with a much sharper clearer sound, and part way
through, the steel pan drum player, (who is also the only female member
of the group,) started singing. A highlight of the set was a song called
(something along the lines of) "Ask The DJ," and it was upbeat
with more of a reggae feel, and little pockets of dance scattered themselves
across the crowd. In one or two songs, Torville Jones, the pianist, took
a lead role and fired out jaw-dropping piano solos that got awesome responses
from the crowd.
All in all, very good, and for a crowd who largely didn't know them, I'd
say they were very impressed, I know I was.
The crowd erupted into cheering and clapping as Amy Winehouse came to
the stage, with bigger hair than ever before, accompanied by seven or
eight men dressed like the Blues Brothers, who assumed their positions
about the stage for their role within the underscore to Amy's singing.
Well what can I say, she ran through a large repertoire of songs, old
and new, as you'd expect really. (I'm not really a fan of Winehouse, I
was here for the Hudson gang, but my friend Izzy said she thought Amy
Winehouse was brilliant!) Song after song seemed to be the crowd's favourite,
judging by the enormity of the cheering. Towards the end of the show,
she introduced her band one by one, and they each did a little solo outburst
on each of their instruments. Now, given her colossal army of a band,
you can imagine this took a while. And the two backing vocalists, (like
in much of the show,) seemed to be trying to outdo each other. Bless them.
Basically, she was good. I mean she sang all her songs well and everything,
and for the older crowd that you'd expect her to reel in, that's perfectly
fine, they aren't wanting a back-flip-filled stage-show and fireworks
every twenty seconds. But if you didn't know any of her songs besides
the overplayed and annoyingly catchy one about rehab, you may find the
show drags on a bit. But saying that, if that does apply to you, you shouldn't
have really paid to go and see her show, should you.
Review By Thom
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