Despite the sly dig at some music critics, TOOTH AND NAIL is
a far-from-subtle and excellent Americana album which has raised Billy’s
profile significantly amongst those with a country leaning. As well as
extensive touring stateside, which has earned respect from the alt-quarters of
Music City, Billy has enlisted the services of a fine up and coming UK multi
guitarist in Chris (CJ) Hillman who demonstrated his expertise on pedal steel,
Dobro, conventional and B-Bender guitars to bring to life the magical sounds of
the current album.
Circulating the lavish surroundings of Birmingham’s Symphony
Hall were the delightful tracks – ‘No One
Knows Nothing Anymore’, Goodbye, Goodbye’, ‘Chasing Rainbows’ and ‘Handyman Blues’ from this album. Also featured
from the release were the ramped up ‘The
Reckoning’ which in true Billy Bragg-tradition warned against the far right
infiltrating the working classes and the Woody Guthrie penned ‘I Ain’t Got No Home’. The latter portrays
the highly respected humility Billy has for the legendary and iconic American
troubadour whose relevance in modern times shows no sign of abating. The link
between Guthrie and the wider Americana sound peaked with a superb version of ‘California Stars’, as this song put
together in association with Wilco proved an adept vehicle for Hillman’s
B-Bender to sparkle.
However this two and a quarter hour set was not just confined
to his transatlantic inspirations as Billy treated the loyal and partisan crowd
to the songs which have defined his career, all interwoven with the political
rhetoric that is as engaging as it is virtually a trademark of his live gigs. So amongst a combination of
macro and micro politics, the audience sang along to old favourites such as ‘New England’, ‘The Milkman of Human Kindness’,
‘Sexuality’ and ‘Levi Stubbs Tears’.
Probably the most poignant song from his back catalogue to grace the set was a
solo version of ‘Between the Wars’ as
the four piece backing band, which had integrated so well with the selected
songs, gave way for Billy to provide a slice of acoustic ambience.
The anecdotes, stories, pleas and rallying calls were
ultimately too frequent to feature explicitly in a concise review but, as well
as taking on board the ultimate enemy of cynicism, the tale of an encounter
with Ramblin’ Jack Elliot in California was ranked high on impact. It ultimately
led into a version of Guthrie’s ‘All You
Fascists Bound to Lose’ and best exemplified the link between Billy’s twin
passion for music and protest.
By the time the audience filed out of the hall with their
ears still ringing from a finale including
‘Power to the Union’ and the closing ‘Great Leap Forward’, there was perhaps
one moment of Bragg brilliance from earlier in the evening to reflect on. His description
of Americana as ‘country music for people who like The Smiths’ wonderfully captured
the essence of a misunderstood genre. The spirit of such a movement has always
resided within the soul of Billy Bragg and, with or without the twang; the
onward march of his poetry, music and passion is still in full stride.