Co-Operative Cambridge Folk Festival
Friday
Apart from the research I'd done for the website, I really knew very little about Rupa or her sound, that was all about to change. Like Brian McNeill, she's not afraid to mix music and politics, her recent album, "Extraordinary Rendition" giving away a clue or two in the title, her approach very different indeed.
Rupa is something of a nomad having spent a lot of time during and since her childhood travelling the world absorbing it's languages and influences, the set is performed in both French and Spanish, as well as English. The nomad applies to her career as well, she's a trained doctor and spends part of her year practicing in her native San Francisco, the other part of the year is given over to music.
She's an artist that oozes presence, she dominates the stage, but not to the detriment of her band, it's not a larger than life thing, more a statement. Her sound has absorbed aspects of her journey, but at the core seems richest in a French influence, if push came to shove, Parisian Left Bank Bordello would be my first choice. There's a definite chanson feel to the vocal delivery at times, but the underlying sound is sleazier, dirtier, more colourful.
With the songs in a number of languages, it really gives Rupa an opportunity to provide a vignette of how the songs came to be written, what influences her and her sense of social responsibility.
To say it was a lively set would be a bit of an understatement, it would be like saying a centipede has a leg or two. Rupa & The April Fishes know how to put together a set and deliver on it.
They were keeping promises they'd never even made. It was rocky, it was sultry, the humidity level was rising inside and outside the tent. This was entertainment par excellent and if I wasn't aware of her sound and potential before the set, I most assuredly was now.
A chat with a couple in the audience confirmed my suspicions, they had got down the front ready for the Demon Barbers and until that point wouldn't have know Rupa from Eve, well that's all changed.
The Demon Barbers won the Best Live Act at this year's Radio Two Folk Awards, they've got one hell of an act to follow, and a pre-pumped up crowd. I've got a real suspicion it's going to be a hell of a night on Stage Two.
The Demon Barbers come in two flavours, The Demon Barbers, which is band and clog dancers; and The Demon Barbers Roadshow, which adds rapper style morris into the mix.
The contrast between the previous act is vast. It says something for the way Cambridge works and the people that come here, that the stage can switch between something so continental and something so quintessentially English and no one bats and eyelash just get set to enjoy it.
There's a reason why the Demon Barbers won Best Live Act, it's the way they take English folk music by the neck and give it a very good shake. One way it does that is by infusing some of the songs with a drum and bass undercurrent to fire an almost infectious grove into the audience.
The temperature rises still further with the appearance of the clog dancers. It's almost like it gives the sound a focus. The audience definitely synchronise to the cloggers on stage. You notice the crowd becoming more physical. Whilst they don't have the space to give it the whole hog there's more energy being expended and it seems as if there's a direct correlation between energy being expended and enjoyment being received.
Similarly with Damien and Bryony swapping vocal duties there is a constantly changing dynamic within the music, you never really get the chance to pause for breath as you're swept away on the atmosphere that the band are helping the audience to create to the benefit of all and this was without the swords.
With half the band being dancers as well, this has got to be one of the fittest bands in the country they certainly leave some of the crowd for dead.
The end of the Demon Barber's set is perilously close to the closing of the bar, fortunately one of the team cut out of The Zutons early and a pint is already on standby.