Gig Review: Robert Vincent - Town Hall, Bilston. Thursday 8th October 2026
The music equivalent of football’s famous saying ‘but can they do it at Stoke on a wet Wednesday night’ has to be ‘Bilston on a wet Thursday’. The odds weren’t exactly stacked in favour of Robert Vincent as he made another stab at playing a West Midlands venue. Joining the Kitchen Garden, Sunflower Lounge, Actress and Bishop and Stourbridge Town Hall, we can now add Bilston Town Hall. Vincent is not alone among his compatriots in finding it tough to establish a foothold in this 2 million strong conurbation. Undoubted interest in an artist of his calibre has yet to be harnessed. The answer lies in innovative promotion, engaging venues and the forging of a community. On the upside, each prospective venture brings a local glimpse of the qualities of one of Britain’s foremost singer-songwriters. An artist weaving Scouse insight onto a Laurel Canyon canvas.
We are in the formative stage of Vincent’s next phase. ‘The best so far’ he impishly boasts. Trajectory is in his favour across four substantive album releases. Nuggets from 2013s LIFE IN EASY STEPS and 2018s I’LL MAKE THE MOST OF MY SINS still glitter like a freshly mined jewel, while the cultural impact of 2020s IN THIS TOWN YOU’RE OWNED still reverberates. However the true standard lies in the celestial melodies decorating 2024s BARRIERS refusing to descend from a drifting cloud. The bar is high for 2027s anticipated SEPARATE THE FICTION FROM THE FACT. We are now at the point of the drip feed in the wake of the inevitable explosion.
Bilston Town Hall saw Robert Vincent at his moderated best. Flanked by double bassist Danny Williams and pianist Anna Corcoran is the optimal offering at this level. The rock ’n’ roll guitar duals are for another day. The accompaniment gave the songs shape and structure. Over the course of an hour and a half, he grew into the surroundings, adapting a tone, feeding off an assembled formation of appreciation. This was an evening of reminders, of how ‘Burn Like Cotton in the Fields’ is a gifted slice of implied country, the poignant mastery of ‘The Kids Don’t Do God Anymore’ and how ‘The Insider’ would fill a blank page in the ‘The Great American Songbook’. The night ended with ‘Demons’ sitting pretty, refusing to budge from its set pinnacle.
However a challenge is planted. The future’s warm up arrow was fired in the shape of a Mary Chapin Carpenter co-write. You don’t reach her status without hitting the ground running with new songs. ‘Everything’s Going To Be Alright’ sparked an awe from first listen and a vision of a rising bar. ‘Separate the Fiction From the Fact’, the track, will scorch the ground on November 6th. The impact, the play out, the intensity, the message - is ‘Demons’ about to be buried?
On an evening where there’s an overwhelming personal investment in the main artist, you should not forget the endeavour of the promotion to test the waters of an unconventional setting. Pete Hubbard was invited to open the show, a contemporary country artist with a keen eye on community as evidenced by the burgeoning opportunities for his style. He is not afraid to step outside his natural habitat and share a different perspective on songwriting to new audiences. A month ago he played with his band at Moseley Folk Festival. This evening it was back to de facto solo in a resourceful and impactful manner.
Bilston for me peaked when Gretchen Peters made her mark with a string of developing shows at the nearby Robin fifteen years ago. On the singer-songwriter front, it’s laid dormant for years. Tonight we had a worthy successor to one of Nashville’s finest. Robert Vincent is on top of his game ahead of a mouthwatering 2027. The promise of playing a pop up stage in the back garden of the Palmeira in Brighton in 2013 has been royally fulfilled.
