The first gig of Joanne Shaw Taylor’s tour saw her roll in to the Tramsheds in Cardiff. I was a bit surprised that it was an all seated event, unusual for the venue in my times there. However, it did make it much more civilized, even if the capacity was reduced by about 60 per cent.
First up was an acoustic set by Jon Allen which was well received by the audience. I admit I have not heard of him before but he did a good set of acoustic tracks that included ‘Bad Penny‘ ‘Take Me To Heart’, ‘No One Gets Out Of Here Alive‘ and the unusually titled ‘Dead Mans Suit’.
As the audience began to fill up, Joanne Shaw Taylor and her band took to the stage and opened up with ‘Stop Messing Around’ from her ‘Blues‘ album.
Full of energy and smiling throughout she really knows her way around a blues riff. That was the story of the night, moving quickly from track to track with the occasional introductory story for a track – the one that stuck in my mind was where she said she’d like to do a full on video with Billy Bob Thornton – but other than that she really let the music do the talking for almost an hour and 45 minutes.
If you ever wondered if she can play guitar-wonder no more, there was blues riff after blues riff, soaring solo after soaring solo, with the best being at the end of ‘Watch em Burn‘ and that voice… If ever one was made for blues, a bit more grit in her voice but so reminiscent of Elkie Brooks.
For the first night of her tour it was obviously a very well-rehearsed set list. This girl should be filling St Davids Hall in Cardiff if she hasn’t already done so.
- The tour continues:
