GIG OF THE WEEK
RAG’N’BONE MAN Islington Academy Hall, London
Every year in the lead-up to the Brit awards, the charity War Child, backed by O2, stages small gigs by some of the bigger names among the nominees. It’s a great idea with one slight snag: the gigs are apt to be more memorable than the Brits.
Rory Graham, aka Rag’n’Bone Man, is the sort of singer Brits voters love – highly successful, selling actual albums, and somewhat indebted to them, as they gave him the Critics’ Choice and British Breakthrough awards last year. This time he’s up for the big ones: British Single, British Album and British Male. If he could just tread on Ed Sheeran on the way in, he might scoop the lot.
He has the voice of an angel and the look of a man exercising his right to bear arms in rural Idaho.
Graham, who comes from Uckfield in Sussex, is a curious mixture. He has the voice of an angel and the look of a man exercising his right to bear arms in rural Idaho. His singing is powerful, yet his presence is tentative.
He still mumbles into his beard at the age of 33, and the spotlights on stage are often pointing out at the crowd. He’s only human, after all. His appeal is one part Adele (real person, highly likeable) to two parts Andrew Strong from The Commitments (big white guy, steeped in a black tradition).
Like Strong, he can sing the blues superbly without looking as if he knows how he does it. And his voice sits well with a horn section – in this case, just a trombonist and a trumpeter, whipping up a warmth to rival The Memphis Horns.
Like Adele, Rag’n’Bone Man is fine on the faster numbers, with a whole band, but even better on the ballads with just voice and piano. Lay My Body Down and Skin both start this way, to riveting effect, before becoming fuller and duller.
The song the fans have come to hear is Human. At first they don’t recognise it, as the band give it a Seventies-funk intro before settling into the 21st-century blues number that has touched millions with its searing simplicity. By the end, it gets the reception it deserves.
Rag’n’Bone Man plays Alexandra Palace, London, on March 8
THIS WEEK’S CD RELEASES
By Adam Woods
Brandi Carlile By The Way, I Forgive You, Elektra, out now
Carlile recently released a video in which she plays new tune The Mother to its subject, her three-year-old daughter Evangeline, and proved that however heartfelt your song, you’ll struggle to captivate a small child. But By The Way, I Forgive You, her sixth album, is great: celebratory on Hold Out Your Hand, rapturous on Sugartooth, delicate and tender on the one for the fidgety little girl.
Fischerspooner Sir, Ultra Music, out now
Emerging in the early 2000s as art headlinegrabbers, Fischerspooner now return in the company of REM star Michael Stipe. A former boyfriend of frontman Casey Spooner, Stipe has produced and partly cowritten the group’s first record in nearly a decade. But this is Spooner’s show, and that means a sinuously compelling collection of dark, grinding synth-pop, telling a tale of middle-aged heartache and hedonism.
Dita Von Teese Dita Von Teese, Record Makers, out now
What kind of debut record does a burlesque performer and former wife of Marilyn Manson make? Sultry French electronic pop, steered by bearded sophisticate Sébastien Tellier. It’s sly and sweet, all breathy vocals and luxurious textures in the established style of Tellier or his stylish friends and label bosses Air.