ELIZA CARTHY, as they say, needs no introduction.
The prodigious multi-instrumentalist and key member of the revered all-star folk collective ‘The Imagined Village’ has collaborated with and been championed by a whole host of high profile icons from the mainstream pop world.
Tonight however, she eclipsed her work with the likes of Nick Cave, Billy Bragg and Paul Weller to shine as a star in her own right, as her versatile talents as a musician and heart-shattering voice fuelled a quite breathtaking showcase of self-penned material.
Often eccentric, Carthy’s songs are only loosely reminiscent of folk music as we know it. Often, scathing and disparaging of male weaknesses and shortcomings, her no-bullshit approach is both perceptive and euphonious, and as her on-stage explanations for each number indicate, her ability to craft fine, beautifully emotive and evocative songs out of situations in everyday life is perhaps her strongest talent of all.
Of course, you can’t succeed on tour unless your band is also strong. Carthy’s supporting cast, with young cellist Beth Porter and double bassist Emma Smith alongside percussionist Willy Molleson (shielded behind a perspex screen) and veteran pianist/accordion maestro Phil Alexander, proved to be as first rate an ensemble as any you might hope to encounter.
What’s more, they could all sing too! There were harmonies were everywhere, five fathoms deep and absolutely perfect throughout; fast came the realisation that Carthy’s music, together with her formidable sex appeal, is as much to drown in as to die for.
This was the last night of a series of dates to promote the November release of single ‘Monkey’ and the bulk of tonight’s set was made up of songs from the latest album, the brilliantly original and heartfelt ‘Neptune’.
Carthy was quick to crank up the drama with the momentum-gathering, half-shanty ‘Hansel’ (Breadcrumbs) - a bitter, rolling tale of out-of-body despair set in her native North Yorkshire (Whitby) about a ‘sullen boy left out of a picnic’.
Carthy’s onstage banter, extensive and entertaining, added an extra dimension to the show. From the rigours of touring (“…from Dublin to Folkestone via Watford Gap”), to her repeated promise to deliver “really miserable songs”, she was able to discourse at length with tonight’s audience never less than spellbound.
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From ‘Neptune’s’ predecessor, ‘Dreams Of Breathing Underwater’, the haunting ‘Two Tears’ could easily have been completely submerged by the myriad sea of vocal harmony that threatened to completely overwhelm us all, had the song not been resurrected by Molleson’s simple but devastating funereal percussion.
Contrast this with the mischievous delight of a self-satisfied troublemaker a la the delicious interlude ‘There’s Gonna Be A Fight’. This brief respite didn’t so much end as melt into the dizzying ethereal ‘Write A Letter’.
If Alexander’s piano and accordion masterclass pushed the folk elements of Carthy’s bullseye narratives to brand-new extremes, then the Carthy/Smith/Porter string arrangements made for a truly epic display of heartfelt emotion.
‘Revolution’ was incredibly powerful and absolutely beautiful – both bittersweet and heart stopping, this was Carthy at her utterly, utterly compelling best.
‘Tea at Five’ saw her take the familiar metaphor of a near-derelict house and push it to new gut-wrenching extremes. Piano-ominous, with a surprisingly effective bass-drum kick, the pure nostalgia scrambled the senses, disorientating thanks to orchestral brilliance, as emotional bearings became hopelessly lost underneath a tidal wave of strings and muted cymbal crashes.
Molleson’s poetic Scots brogue set the scene for the ironic and pathetic tale of ‘Mr. Magnifico’ (again from ‘Dreams…’), a man seeking to take advantage of two young female French backpackers). Again, this was a fine example of Carthy’s deadly accurate ‘see straight through you’ portrayals of those men in her life who never even came close to cutting it.
With the aforementioned new single coming as part of a clutch of still-miserable songs that unfolded at a ‘deceptively happy tempo’, this was a fantastic show from one of traditional music’s leading lights performing as never before; truly a night to remember.
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