Venue:
Clifton Cathedral, Bristol
Date: 21/04/2015
Take three extravagantly talented women, all at the top of their games instrumentally and vocally, all of whom have been a part of stellar acoustic bands of one sort or another and equally successful as individuals, all of whom have worked with some of the very best musicians playing today. Put them in a room together and watch a band form. Hear their uniquely individual voices form a beautiful new identity when their perfect harmonies mesh. Put them on tour in their homeland, the USA, and watch them grow and develop a group performance that really works as an entity in its own right. Let them hone their act and learn how to play the room together. Send them to Europe for their first ever real tour, and let them start the UK tour proper with a gig in Bristol’s wonderfully airy and light modern catholic Cathedral in the leafy streets of Clifton on a balmy April night. Give them the deft skills of some of our very best home grown sound engineering talent in an enormous reverb heavy space that lets a falling pin splash across the soundscape with clarity and depth. Fill the auditorium with a quiet and attentive audience liberally sprinkled with the gathered cognoscenti, movers and shakers of the local Americana scene and what do you get? “I’m With Her” at Clifton Cathedral last evening, that’s what you get. Sara Watkins, Sarah Jarosz and Aoife O’Donovan are now the three thirds of “I’m With Her”. They will charm and enchant you. Catch them on this tour if you can; trust me, they are not to be missed.
The audience:
Perfectly behaved. All the seats were occupied, and they were standing at the back of the church. No coughers, no mutterers. A reserved few “Yeah!”s. The woman who occasionally hummed the bass lines somewhere behind me was exactly in tune and had exquisite timing; I quite enjoyed her bass runs. Hallelujah.
It made me think..
Gigs like this should be on the National Health.
It made me think: you lucky devil, Wolfboy.
Seen ’em all separately and would do so gladly, but together must have been fab.
Was it just the 3 or was there any backing, SJ having a prticularly good cellist in her own outings.
Just the three of them. Between them they played guitar, mandolin, mandocello, ukelele, banjo and fiddle. Plus boot stamps and claps. A cello would have been a good addition, but I didn’t miss it! They were exquisite. Songs from all solo sources, songs from several previous bands, and inspired covers – opening the set with Hiatt’s “Crossing Muddy Waters” for example. They sang their own and they sang each others. They played a couple each on their own, and joined each other as required. You’d have thought they’d been in this combo for years and years together. They made it seem effortless.
“turns green with envy”
That sounds wonderful. Lucky you!
Thanks for the review and putting this trio on my map. I will most certainly look out for them. I suspect @duco01 would join me for the gig if they play here too.
Most certainly, good sir.
I would
I = wood
Brilliant review VV. The only disappointment is that I looked on the tax dodgers site immediately after reading your review hoping to find a cd by the trio but was sadly disappointed, now you are going to really ppiss me off by saying they had product at the show?
Plus point thought I did get the last Sarah Watkins cd for £4.75 so a little bit of a result.
Yes, there was a merch pew.
The girls were all there, and I bought that Sara Watkins CD directly from the woman herself. It cost me twice what you paid, but I got to look her in the eye. She sang the second track from it last night, with just a uke and no accompaniment beyond the sound of her own heel keeping time in the hugeness. Stunning.
The only product they had on sale last night that is unique to them as a band was a two-track single with their set-opener (as mentioned above) and their closer; “Be My Husband” by Andy Stroud, which they sang a capella. It’s published/distributed by Sugar Hill / yep Roc Records, and was recorded in NY. It’s dated 2015. Try searching the Sugar Hill website!
According to the link under the Vevo video of “Crossing Muddy Waters”, there’s a vinyl available on mail order.
John Hiatt posted the video on his Facebook page the other week: he said it “nearly made him cry”.
Wow sounds fantastic. I’ve seen 2/3rds of them but the trio sounds great
Here’s the rest of the tour if anyone’s interested. Sadly the London date doesn’t work for me…
24 April • Gateshead, UK • Sage Gateshead
25 April • Bury, UK • The Met
26 April • Sheffield, UK • Memorial Hall
28 April • London, UK • Union Chapel
29 April • Oxford, UK • St Johns the Evangelist
2 May • Derry, NI • Cultúrlann Uí Chanáin
3 May • Kilkenny, IE • Kilkenny Roots Festival
4 May • Sligo, IE • The Hawk’s Well Theatre
5 May • Dublin, IE • Whelan’s
This is my first time here. I stumbled upon your blog looking for review for the I’m With Her tour – and a great review I found!
I got tickets for the Union Chapel date a couple of months ago after Sara Watkins’ stellar performance as part of Transatlantic Sessions.
I’ve been looking forward to it for weeks, though my companion just got called away for work and will arrive back in UK too late to attend. I was planning to try to sell the tickets on, but after reading such rapturous words I will redouble my efforts to persuade some buddy or other to accompany me.
Thanks!
Welcome along Tim. Lots of love for modern bluegrass here!
Glad I wrote it and you found it! You won’t regret going to see them. I only wish I could go again. And welcome to this lovely madhouse.
Hi Tim. Pull up a pew.
Hey Timothy! (Hope you don’t mind me calling you that, we have a lot of Tims here).
You should stick around and take the tour, you might find this place very much to your liking…
Are you one of the appalachian Charpers?
Welcome indeed.
Banjos welcome (well, to some of us)
I’m quite taken with the one on the left.
I saw her first. Voice. Glasses. Huhhhhhhhh.
Fell in love with 2/3rd of these folks on Craig Ferguson (and he gets mentioned again round here), and posted both in the old new place. Or possible the old place.
Sara Watkins is also a funny bugger, cropping up on Nerdist podcast and as far as I know a regular at Largo with the LA comedy crowd.
I saw this show on Saturday at Bury Met. They were absolutely exquisite and brought the house down. It’s a shame they are not touring more widely in the UK. The opener Samuel Ford was pretty good too
Going to the Union Chapel tomorrow. Looking forward to it very much now.
They were every bit as good at the Union Chapel as I expected after reading this thread. They are outstanding singers and musicians and they sang and played beautifully. The sound was good and the audience were attentive and enthusiastic.
The London crowd had the lucky bonus of John Paul Jones joining Sara Watkins on a couple of songs from her first album (which he produced).
The whole night was a joy.
He must love that place. He appeared when I saw Nick Lowe there about a year ago.
Saw the wonderful Sara, Sarah & Aoife at the Kilkenny Rhythm & Roots festival last night.
What struck me was as another poster has said, you would think they have been together for years.
The musicianship was truly execllend but what really gave me goosebumps were the harmonies.
Met the lovely ladies afterwords and asked if they have an album planned. Sara said she and Aoife aere working on solo projects, they plan to do something together following that.