Gig review: The Bevvy Sisters / The Deadly Gentlemen

Published on Sunday 31 January 2010 21:33

CLASSIC GRAND, GLASGOW ****

LAUNCHING their self-released debut album St James Sessions, on a tide of advance radio play and glowing word of mouth, Edinburgh harmony trio The Bevvy Sisters ensured a long queue at the merchandise stall in the interval with a set that started off at excellent, progressed swiftly to stunning, and fetched up as positively spectacular.

From three or four songs in, highlight followed highlight until they left their audience baying for more. With the enthrallingly intertwined voices of Heather Macleod, Lindsey Black and Kaela Rowan vibrantly backed by guitarist David Donnelly, double bassist Jenny Hill and drummer James Mackintosh, an early standout was Rowan's own flirtatious yet jazzily acerbic The Way You Know You Do.

It was immediately followed by the luxuriant, lingering, dreamily distilled longing of 1,000 Miles, penned by Donnelly, and later by a magnificent rendering of Pete Seeger's gospel anthem Mary Don't You Weep, its sumptuous slow crescendo building to a truly awesome climax.

Led by Crooked Still banjo prodigy Greg Liszt, US four-piece The Deadly Gentleman sounded a tempting prospect on paper, mixing hot contemporary bluegrass and all-acoustic instrumentation with rock and hip-hop rhythms, plus spoken vocals pitched somewhere between talking blues and rap.

Such contours of their music as were discernible in a woefully fuzzy, bass-heavy, feedback-prone sound mix – as opposed to The Bevvy Sisters' pristine amplification – seemed likewise tempting, but the many subtleties fleshing it out beyond flash, thrash and attitude were very largely lost.