If you're going to a gig, go early and catch the opening act!
I made a trip to the o2 Academy in Birmingham on a windy Wednesday night
to catch Elles Bailey on her current tour – but also to see Demi Marriner
playing the opening set. Demi is well
known on the UK scene and can often be seen supporting other artists either
with her full band or as a solo performer
The Academy 3 is a fairly intimate room with a capacity of 250 and a
fairly small stage, which was already set up with all the instruments for the 5
piece headline band. When Demi came on,
just a girl and a guitar there was a danger that she could be a little lost
amongst all that kit but her voice, her music and her personality were more
than strong enough to grab the 30 or so people in the room
The opening song was “Stay” – a mournful song, apologetic in its lyrics
but still catchy – in fact most of Demi’s songs have a catchy chorus, so by the
end you are singing along as though you've known the song for years, even on a
first listen
The set consisted of songs from the EP “Dandelion”, the EP “Tales”
which was recorded on just one microphone and some new songs – one only a week
old!
It feels as though we are supposed to always label the genre of an
artiste, but with Demi it isn’t straightforward. She is quite Country, quite Americana, sometimes
bordering on Bluegrass with her final song “Sins” and some of her performance is very much in the style of the classic
female singer songwriters – think Beverly Craven, Julia Fordham, Judie Tzuke –
although her snakeskin boots do scream country!
Working through her songs – “One Way Conversation”, “Sunday Morning Alone” (with
some very high notes showing Demi’s range), “What Am I Doing Here”, “Distorted
Desire” “Cold Coffee” Demi displayed increased confidence talking between songs
but still with that trademark humility whenever she gets applause, with her
quite shy “Thank You Very Much” each time, but when she sings you can really
feel how confident she is and how much she loves her songs and singing them.
We were treated to that brand new song “Little Boy” which had a really country theme – advice to the newest baby in the extended
family, from the previous youngest family member, dedicated to her new baby
cousin
Demi is currently quite busy supporting various tours, but will shortly
be back in the studio recording new music – and then we can hope that she will
be taking centre stage where she rightfully belongs on her own headline tour
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