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Amelia Curran

Venue: The Slaughtered Lamb
Town: London
Date: 5th February 2013
Website: http://www.ameliacurran.com

I've never actually been to Celtic Connections, the two week long festival held in Glasgow late January - early February each year celebrating roots music from both sides of the Atlantic. I do, like many others, enjoy it's trickle down benefits: Old Crow Medicine Show came down to London via Manchester; John Fullbright stopped long enough to record a session for Bob Harris plus a sell out at The Slaughtered Lamb and Amelia Curran, fresh from supporting Aimee Mann came down to the capital before heading back up the country. This is not to say that Celtic Connections is the only reason that these and other acts cross the pond but it does make for a late winter concentration of quality that my otherwise have been spread thinly over the months.

Curran is no stranger to the UK; indeed she is no stranger to The Slaughtered Lamb - arguably the premier roots venue in London now. Her last visit seemed a little rowdier (or rather the audience was) as she announced that The Mistress could also be used as a drinking game one table entered into the spirit a little too wholeheartedly as one stood up mid song and shouted "more drink"! Curran now tells her audiences of the drinking aspect post rather than pre song.

This is, in a nutshell, the thrust of Curran's performance. She 'babbles'; babbles about life, babbles about love, babbles about drink and babbles about babbling. Her mom is a constant source of material whether it is rambling telephone conversations about nothing apart from a bombshell dropped in the last sentence or her impressing on her to wear the right colour (everybody has, apparently not only their colour but also the right season) Curran and most of the audience are sceptical about this. Her sister, an important lawyer, also features with impressions of her saying "anyhooo" to the judge complete with arms wide apart like a footballer celebrating a goal. The beauty of this is that it never seems rehearsed or contrived.

This would have been nothing without the songs to back them up. With the release of a new album 'Spectators' due in a week, unsurprisingly most of the songs came from it. The arrangements on the album include use of electric instruments, strings, harmony vocals and brass. There were none of these in attendance, just Curran and her acoustic guitar, her songs and her stories. The songs are strong enough to take this bareness; San Andreas Fault does not suffer by the absence of a militaristic snare drum opening or the lack of harmony vocals on the chorus.

I did look to make it to other gigs on her tour but they were all a bit too far away; I'll just have to wait for the next time she is over.

John 'The Jacket' Hawes
photocredit:Bud Gaulton