Folk Bitch Trio + Alex Amen @ La Toscadura▪

It’s an evening of firsts at La Toscadura tonight. First up, Texan/Californian Alex Amen is playing his first-ever show in Canada; on the strength of tonight’s 40 minutes, we can only hope it’s not his last. His sound is very stripped down from his usual four-piece show, and he looks every bit the solo country singer he presents tonight, right down to the double knees and the cowboy boots.

Musically, he covers all facets of the country spectrum too. He sounds kinda like Harry Nilsson on Cabin By The Sea, though with some mind-blowing fingerpicking in sections that are absolutely nothing like him; Bosque is more bluegrass for sure, though the fingerpicking is no less impressive. Elsewhere, songs like California Blues are much more, well, bluesy. A few flirtations with a harmonica are the icing on the country cake. An excellent debut, and one to watch for sure as the current nu-country wave picks up steam.

For Melbourne three-piece Folk Bitch Trio, consisting of Gracie Sinclair, Jeanie Pilkington, and Heide Peverelle, this is their first headline show in Canada, in support of their phenomenal debut Now Would Be a Good Time. Gracie jokes midway through the set, “How it made it to you is a mystery!” A stellar appearance on Stephen Colbert last month probably didn’t hurt their cause.

Arriving on stage to the disco beats of Candi Staton’s Young Hearts Run Free (which is about as upbeat as the set gets), they start with their vocal-only cover of I’ll Find a Way (to Carry It All), and that’s when it hits like a slap in the face. Their angelic vocal harmonies sound majestic on record, of course, but that was in a studio; any bum notes could easily be fixed. Here, live on a foreign stage, they still start off in perfect time (no metronome or other mechanical cheat for keeping time), in perfect harmony; it’s phenomenal. Within seconds, you know you’re in for a treat.

Throughout the set, Heide is always on the electric guitar, while Jeanie and Gracie rotate the acoustic guitar (though sometimes both are on acoustic duty). However, all three take turns to lead the vocals, Jeanie on songs like Hotel TV and Foreign Bird, Heide on The Actor and That’s All She Wrote, and Gracie on Moth Song and Cathode Ray. Whoever it is, the other two back them up note perfectly every time. Props to the crowd too; there is absolutely no bar chatter interfering with the sound. You could hear a pin drop the entire time; well, except for older non-album song Analogue, which someone sings along to quietly and respectfully. Still, it doesn’t go unnoticed by Gracie, who gleefully exclaims at the conclusion, “SOMEONE KNEW THE WORDS!”

At times, the set reminds me of the first time I ever saw Laura Marling in 2010, in the cozy, now-defunct Le Divan Orange. The sound inexplicably cut out about two songs in, so Laura dismissed her entire backing band and proceeded to perform the entire show solo and acoustic, completely impromptu. It blew my mind, and I will never forget how My Manic And I sounded that night; it gives me goosebumps just thinking about it, that single vocal floating around the room with such dominance and yet such fragility. There are times in the set tonight that I am transported back to that aura, such as the glorious Sarah and set closer God’s A Different Sword. Funny how such unrelated memories can interconnect like that.

It’s an exceptional hour from start to finish. It’s fragile, it’s magical, it’s unmissable; please go and see them next time they’re in town and you will see exactly what I mean.