Black Country, New Road & Cameron Picton 4/24/24

... as you'd guess from the topic title and the name, that first opener was none other than Cameron Picton of Black Midi, who has been stretching his wings with solo recordings and performances to match Geordie Greep's own New Sound and Swing Boys shows. Picton performed almost exclusively classical guitar, using that style's options to explore a variety of emotions and interests across his half hour set. He has excellent aptitude for love songs, which made up half of his performance and showed more sides of his fascinatingly idiosyncratic lyricism. The first highlight of his set for me though was the second song, where he played complex flamenco-adjacent guitar while repeatedly moving his instrument's position from the classical standard into other angles while almost shredding through his piece. Get Picton on stage with Al Di Meola immediately. A later song featured him temporarily breaking into a take on "Copacabana"'s first verse where he didn't remember half of the lyrics. The other highlight was his sort of bonus final cut, his song "365 Party Boy" which resembled some sort of disco or EDM cut where he backed himself with a thumping bass drum beat (quite unlike a version of the song played at The Windmill I have seen) while grooving out with both his steady guitarwork and hypnotic singing. And in any case I believe his setlist - which for the life of me I can't properly reconstruct - featured the solo cuts "Perfect London" and "disstrack" which you can peruse alternate versions of on Youtube.

Horsegirl's performance felt softer and gentler than their Bowery opening almost two years ago. We await the next studio step from them, but in any case their arguably lighter style that night was welcome and invigorating. With the ever trading vocalist/guitarists Nora Cheng and Penelope Lowenstein constantly switching out and borrowing their various instruments, they played gorgeous and loud music that soothed and challenged the soul alike. Their drummer Gigi Reece also deserves special recognition for their powerful rhythmic work in this set.

Coming out to the bombast of Beyonce's classic "Crazy In Love", BCNR quickly steeled themselves for their usual complicated and gentle showing with the escalating beauty of their new song "For The Cold Country", it's crescendo the template for the evening. Their skill and balance between power and tenderness defined their almost hour and twenty minute set, ever eclectic, warm, and tender. Following on excellent performances of their earlier/Live At Bush Hall cuts "The Boy" and "Laughing Song", the beautifully obvious was pointed out: this show would feature a slim majority of newer songs. The following three songs, all pristine, showed off their power and dexterity. This part of the show was closed out by the earlier "Turbines/Pigs", most of the band back in storytime mode as Georgia Ellery and May Kershaw tenderly played this instant classic.

As we neared the end of the night, we got a performance by all but Kershaw of identical recorders for a unique and pretty cut. Following that the climax was based around the LABH song "Dancers", with Tyler Hyde rising from her seat to sing and play on this extended and explosive take on the cut. Shimmering under the evening blue ceiling and almost century old statues, BCNR closed the show with rolling aplomb. I eagerly hunger for what's next.