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Blackbeard's Tea Party + Starface Pendergast

Venue: Sound Control
Town: Manchester
Date: 2/11/13
Website: http://www.blackbeardsteaparty.com

A long awaited gig as a tour celebrating a third album release 'Whip Jamboree' tours the country stopping off near me at Sound Control in Manchester. I have followed Blackbeard's Tea Party's work for a while, first seeing them leading a ceilidh back in Shrewsbury in 2012.

The folk/rock band was supported by two acts the first being a young lady called Tara, or to use her stage name (possibly spare of the moment and highly regretted): Starface Pendergast. Tara started with a smallish audience as people were still arriving, but she soon kicked off the gig and quickly drew the attention of the room.

Her set up was simple, a girl with a guitar singing what I believe are original songs with a storyteller style of play. Slow strumming gave emphasis to her tales and brought all the listeners to attention with a varied voice range, really hitting the high notes but remaining gentle and soft singing. One really good observation is how her range of singing was used effectively and not simply for the sake of it. Definitely the sign of a great singer/songwriter}

There was a second support act called Prose, which used a combination of rapping and indie but didn't really enter the kind of music I have much experience with. They played well though and the audience were taken with them.

The much awaited Blackbeard's Tea Party sprung into action quickly and kick started with a rock instrumental tune 'Devil in the Kitchen' which saw the whole team rock on their instruments and immediately get an atmosphere skyrocketing through the crowd.

The vocal songs like 'The Valiant Turpin' and 'I Can Hew' had many members of audience singing along and dancing whilst the band themselves sung and danced around just as much on the stage. There was plenty of synchronisation with the stage banter that made the whole experience look and feel fun.

The bands on-stage chemistry really helps to make them a fantastic live act, helped by the good variety of songs from their last two albums 'Tomorrow We'll Be Sober' and 'Whip Jamboree', featuring favourites like naughty 'Landlady', the hilarious 'Landlord' and tunes people can rock dance too like 'I Want a Pizza and a Drink', 'The New Jigs' and 'Whitstable Cottage/ Superfly'.

The final song of the gig was the title track of the third album 'Whip Jamboree' and was great finisher to the show... until the audience demanded an encore and Blackbeard's Tea Party happily obliged with a hearty rendition of 'Chicken on a Raft', complete with actions and audience participation. I should note at this stage that when I say audience participation I mean absolutely everyone was there in the main crowd dancing. (Except for the bar staff... although I'm sure they felt left out).

If I had to give some criticisms then I would only have two. The first is that I could not hear the melodeon at all during the show, and there were times when the fiddle too was quite drowned. This is of course always a problem with live shows and with such a delicate balance of instruments it is not really surprising.

My second complaint is it was too short! It was a fantastic gig and an hour was just not long enough to even scratch the surface of what this band has to offer. A cruel appetiser to what I wish had been a full three course meal.

So to wrap up here is a picture of me with the band (well four of them, the other two ran off)...(I'm the one in the hat by the way...)

Paul Rawcliffe