It's kinda difficult not to warm to a young feller who kickstarted his musical career by half-inching his sister's Bontempi organ when he was aged eight so he could learn to play The Beach Boys' "Summer Dreams", but in person CRAYONSMITH'S Ciaran Smith gentle, disarming manner soon melts the spots in your heart that haven't already given way.
Onstage tonight in support of Windings' album launch, he initially seems a little lost and crippled with nerves behind his electric guitar, but once opening track "Lock In" has kicked in properly, you begin to realise he has plenty of talent tucked away. Although he's alone up there, his trusty DAT machine has a whole band in tow on most of his tracks, and during songs like the temptation-fuelled "Drunken Smile" and the waltz-time "Jail Mary" (I think this is the title) where he puffs on a reedy, Neil Young-ish harmonica, it's clear he has a knack for quirkily memorable pop.
He's not afraid to take chances, either. After all, few performers would make the leap of faith required to serenade their audience off-mic with merely a spindly acoustic guitar as Crayonsmith does during "Burning Patience." The fact you can hear a pin drop as he does so only reinforces his capabilities as one to watch in the future, and it's compounded again when his closing tune (I missed the title) roars into life with the sound of a car engine firing up and winds down with our hero playing the final coda on a rainbow-coloured glockenspiel. With hindsight, misappropriating his sibling's musical resource was clearly an inspired act of theft, it seems.
Not that WINDINGS is any less of a revelation, though his (mostly) subtle, emotional music is something of a peception re-aligner for anyone who knows this Limerick resident -just known simply as Steve - better in his other life as half of the city's bruising duo giveamanakick. With that outfit, musclebound punk rock's traditionally the order of the day, but Windings are a different kettle of newts altogether.
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For starters, there's no splayed-legs, scissor kicks or screamed vocals. Instead, Steve merely sits quietly and looks uncannily like Damon Gough minus the tea cosy hat behind his big Epiphone, while cohort Liam (formerly of Steve's 'other' band Tooth) quietly brushes in further Telecaster colour from the shadows stage left.
Windings' eponymous debut album (due in days on the excellent Out On A Limb label) showases an eclectic set taking in low-key electronica, acoustic singer/ songwriter musings and the occasional loud rawk rumble, but tonight is mostly a stripped down, gently emotional affair, perhaps epitomised best by the unhurried beauty of "Little Hands" or the heartbreaking, Elliott Smith-style re-invention of "Bright Eyes". And yes, we're taking Art Garfunkel and "Watership Down" rather than Conor Oberst here.
It's not all tenderness, though. Indeed, tracks like "Princess" from the new album, with its' choppy, nervy riffing can still drag us into the woods for a good kicking, while the initially becalmed closing selection gradually morphs into a deafening crescendo that would have Kevin Shields' rubbing his hands with glee. You can only remove so much of the noise from a man's head after all, eh?
So absolutely no complaints. Both Windings and Crayonsmith are digging their scenes and ploughing cool, quirky pop furrows of their own. They promise and deliver throughout an intimately memorable evening and are poised to enrich the underground in the near future. Keep an eye out for both.
(www.windingswindings.com)
(www.outonalimbrecords.com)
(www.crayonsmith.com)
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