Live review: Joseph Arthur

A SINGER-songwriter would normally struggle to excuse himself for spending the first five minutes of a set wrangling with the sound man. But Joseph Arthur has, as he pointed out, played King Tut's eight times now over the last ten years and could probably lay reasonable claim to understanding the venue's acoustics better than most.

The Ohio-born, Brooklyn-based strummer was "discovered" by Peter Gabriel in the mid-90s, and signed to his Real World label. Since then he's toured with REM, duetted with Michael Stipe, been covered by Coldplay's Chris Martin and released six albums, a few of which have been critically lauded to the high heavens. All of which poses the question: why is he still playing the same small venues?

A shortage of authenticity wouldn't appear to be the answer: tall and thin in a beat-up suit jacket and black shades, he looked every bit the strung-out rocker dude who's lived each line of his broken hearted, dark and opaquely druggy lyrical tales. Rather, there was just something deeply clichd and identikit about his Dylan, Lennon and The Stones-influenced acoustic rock.

Although he sang passionately, in his agreeably coarse, croaky tones, as a performer he seemed jaded and only really made the effort to natter with his – evidently enraptured – audience between songs when prompted. If rustily going through the motions like this is always Arthur's way, he can have few complaints if he's still playing at Tut's another decade down the line.