Down in Bishopston, something stirs

The heart of alt.country Americana comes to a parish church hall in the backwoods of Bishopston. How do they do it? When I last went there was a crowd (crowd?) of around 10 for the wonderful Joe Henry. He deserved better – did anyone else know he was playing there? So imagine our surprise to discover what seemed a stadium-size crowd for Richmond Fontaine. A group who won the hearts of all the middle aged rock mags (Uncut, Mojo etc) in the UK a couple of years back, before being cast aside again which maybe explains why they now keep popping up in Bristol. There was some trepidation as to whether they would live up to my own fevered expectations – if they were that good what were they doing in a room previously occupied by so few people? Well not to worry. They appeared as a five piece – two fender telecasters, one pedal steel (alternated with trumpet), bass and drums. As they developed a groove on the first number the guitarist upped and legged it, the others carrying on and paying him no mind. In fact he only reappeared for the closing chords. An interesting start. However, as they got further into their act the better they got. Tracks from their recent albums intertwined with older ones back to Post to Wire – including the fabulously weird Willamette giving them a chance to freak out in a psychedelic style as they used to say. Not to everyone’s taste but definitely mine. In Willy Vlautin they have a songwriter who explores the darker side of life – again, not everyone’s choice but I love a bit of angst-riddled depression – whilst maintaining a relaxed repartee with the crowd. He announced that we’d be able to dance to the next one. We couldn’t and I’d claim no-one even tried. The rest of the band were on the mark too – fine lead guitar and fabulous pedal steel and much better than you’d think dollops of trumpet which really did work. And the bass player has his own solo album out which is some feat (although the track he played for one of the encores suggested his songwriting skills are not as well-honed as Willy’s. So a fine show to the truncated end – he announced they could only play one more and someone pointed out that there were still two listed on his set-list. Blame the cruel burghers of Bristol or something. He and the band were great.