We’re just three songs into The Barr Brothers set and the band have already found their stride. Playing lead single, Even The Darkness Has Arms, Brad Barr’s lead guitar duels with Sarah Page’s, exquisite harp, faster and faster building the tempo. He finally let’s rip with the solo and hollers and whoops echo out from the crowd. It would be easy at this stage to think that the peak has come too early, but not a chance. This is just one of many, many more to come.
After the low key release of 2011’s slow burning, self-titled debut, The Barr Brothers have slowly been making waves in their native Canada, the US and the now the UK. A November appearance on American institute, The Letterman show, saw the host declaring he’d quit his day job to manage the band and appearances on BBC Six Music and Radio 2 have since followed.
Support is provided by Kate Stables who informs us that her band is called This Is The Kit although tonight, it’s just her. She’s easily likeable with a nervous charm and a beautiful English folk voice. She mixes intricately finger picked songs on the banjo with heavier bluesy riffs delivered on a hollow body electric. She’s gracious and funny and the crowd quickly warm to her.
Although a fantastic venue and a mecca for under the radar bands, The Deaf Institute doesn’t boast the biggest stage in the world. With a drum kit, a pedal steel, a double bass and a full size harp (yes, a harp), not to mention countless guitars, tonight it looks even smaller. Thankfully the Barr Brothers are a band comfortable with loving in each other’s pockets, some of the best moments coming when two, three or even four of the band crowd around one mike, easing their way past instruments, to deliver perfectly weighted harmonies.
It’s an incredible spectacle to watch. The majority of the band are multi instrumentalists and fantastic musicians too; pedal steel is swapped for a banjo, double bass for a bass guitar, drums for a guitar, a harp for…a smaller handheld harp. It’s effortless and flawless. Off the top of my head I can’t recall the last time I had the pleasure of watching a band this tight.
The music flows from the laid back Americana of Beggar In The Morning to the slide guitar driven blues of Lord I Just Can’t Keep From Crying. You feel this is a band that could turn their hand to anything and make it feel fresh, new, their own.
All night the audience are in the palm of their hand. A request for the audience to ‘please shut up’ for a particularly hushed performance of How The Heroine Dies is met with instant obedience. A sign of an audience fully absorbed in the performance being delivered in front of them.
Just watching The Barr Brothers perform is a rush. It’s rare to see musicians of this quality performing together and it’s rarer still to find such perfect chemistry within a band. They don’t need to worry about trying to find their niche; they’ve got more than enough of what it takes to carve their own.
Review by Jon Birch
