Last November the supertruth was found in the small rural
town of Bewdley, this evening it appeared somewhere between the moon and the
Midwest. At the end of 2015 SEARCHING FOR THE SUPERTRUTH was hailed as one of
the favourite albums to hit the stores over the year and now momentum is
building as to whether BETWEEN THE MOON AND THE MIDWEST reaches similar lofty
accolade territory when the book for this year closes in two months. Sneaking
up on the blind side though is SONGS OF THE RIVER REA, but more on that later.
For the initiated, The Dreaming Spires and Austin Lucas will
need little introduction as recording artists of distinction. For others they
lie in wait as the discovery to edge you a little closer to finding the golden
key of live connective music. Opportunity had presented itself when their
combined tour was announced, no doubt on the back of the At The Helm Records connection.
The result was a classic display of cultured musicianship, devoid of external control
and ripe with the ideals of artists exploiting the mood of a distinctive style.
Travelling to Birmingham this evening all the way from
Bloomington Indiana (well semi-literally) was Austin Lucas. Although a seasoned
visitor to these shores, this year the focus has been from a different angle
with a brand new record successfully turning heads and a new team providing the
industry structure. While Austin toured the album release earlier this year, it
was the delightfully anointed ‘leftist Mecca in a sea of red’ aka Asheville
North Carolina which hosted my first experience of catching him live. The
upgrade from that evening in The Mothlight was the involvement of a four piece
backing band in The Dreaming Spires, while the downgrade was the sad passing of
Austin’s trusty sidekick Sally. Surely her spirit is there at every show.
The set up at the Hare and Hounds this evening aided the
ease of getting up close and personal with the emotive spontaneity of Austin
Lucas’s artistic expression. Fired up by a mid-set rant-fuelled outburst on a
shared sentiment, this crowned the tone of a performance which began and almost ended
in solo mode, the latter unplugged among the audience; the ultimate uncensored
and unfiltered moment of music consumption. The focus throughout was primarily
on the excellent current album BETWEEN THE MOON AND THE MIDWEST. Its stellar
lead-off track ‘Unbroken Hearts’ is
now almost sealed as one of the songs that will shape 2016, with tonight
possibly just missing the pedal steel input from perfection. Regardless of
this, it is deeply personal, highly emotive and a potential anthem for the
unsigned. This along with others such as ‘Pray
for Rain’, ‘Wrong Side of the Dream’,
‘Ain’t We Free’ and ‘Kristie Rae’ is country music you won’t
hear packaged. Any tampering would be purely superfluous to a successful feat
of making music that matters. The pick of Austin’s oldies was the wonderfully
catchy ‘Alone in Memphis’, which
conveniently allows us to rewind to The Dreaming Spires, and their own homage
to west Tennessee.
Apart from playing an important part in this evening’s
upgrade of Austin Lucas from that hot July night across the pond, The Dreaming
Spires played a forty-five minute support set packed with an abundance of
stylish cultured moments. Austin’s aforementioned classic ‘Unbroken Hearts’ ascension into the ‘songs that shape the year’
category will follow in the footsteps to what ‘Dusty in Memphis’ did for The Dreaming Spires in 2015. Once again
this was a strong candidate for the pick of the set, with a pulsating opening
version of ‘Easy Rider’ and the
finely executed playing of a now Spires oldie ‘Not Every Song From the Sixties is a Classic’, making similar
exalted cases.
Give The Dreaming Spires a five minutes sample of your
valuable limited listening time and the rewards will be long lasting. They
rarely stay still as active collaborators even in years where a full length
band record is not on the agenda. Folks could enjoy their PAISLEY OVERGROUND
interim release this year, but the highly anticipated moment is when the
brilliant SEARCHING FOR THE SUPERTRUTH (and its unlimited pun potential) gets
its fully fledged follow up. In the meantime, The Dreaming Spires continue to
cultivate a niche as England’s premium purveyors of transatlantic alt-country
rock laced with an inner layer of classic melody driven alt-pop.
On a gig held in Birmingham, it is only apt to hear a bunch
of songs to open the evening from an album inspired by the city’s hidden river,
SONGS OF THE RIVER REA. The architect of this fine album is Katy Rose Bennett,
a Birmingham resident and conveniently this evening the sister of Robin and Joe
Bennett from The Dreaming Spires. Hence Joe accompanied Katy on a couple of
songs with backing vocals and lap steel, while the full band (only Austin
missing) joining her for the final number ‘My
Friend’. Katy’s album surfaced earlier this year and has evolved into one
of the surprise hits of the year, if only in the fact that it has probably been
down on her priority list over the last few years. However ‘Rusted Ring’, ‘Jack and Ivy’ and ‘Cold November Day’ all sounded great
live for the first time and now the spotlight turns to Katy’s headline full
band show in early November. Ironically in Bewdley, at the scene of the
supertruth discovery, though alas no Dreaming Spires!
Nights like this make venturing out to live music a magical
experience. Three artists compounding the innovation of original music; fully
committed to sharing the wares of their creative endeavours and fusing the art
of reactionary song. If ‘music of the soul’ needs three ambassadors, look no
further than Austin Lucas, The Dreaming Spires and Katy Rose Bennett.
www.thedreamingspires.co.uk
www.katyrosebennett.com
