The Setlist & The Script

Jimmy’s Liverpool wasn’t packed to the gills, but that was probably just as well as the burgeoning talents of Sunderland’s Tom A. Smith and a supporting cast of supremely talented, young artists needed a bit of elbow room to showcase their prodigious gifts.

First up to impress was local singer Fiona Lennon. I have seen Fiona before, backed with a band, but this was my first time seeing her alone on stage with just her guitar for company. The isolation only added to the intimacy of an enjoyably delicate performance of original material that opened with Coming of Age, included You Really Got A Hold On Me and concluded with latest single A Little Longer.

When someone like Paloma Faith says ‘Ruby J has a unique voice’ you better sit-up and take notice. Paloma is not wrong. You can trace stylistic elements in Ruby’s vocals – Vera Hall, Nina Simone, Macy Gray – but the sum is so much more than the parts. Equally captivating was Ruby J’s guitar playing – simultaneously encompassing indie, folk, rock, Spanish, funk and Jazz stylings.

Ruby J’s set was an even mixture of well executed covers starting with a mash-up of Ain’t No Sunshine and I Need a Dollar, and included Trouble So Hard and The Black Keys Lonely Boy. Equally well delivered were Ruby’s own songs like Try and latest single The Game. Between songs Ruby engaged with the crowd and demonstrated a confidence and stagecraft that many older artists should be envious of.

Originally from the Isle of Anglesey, now fighting out of Manchester, but a semi-permanent fixture on the Merseyside music scene, this was Megan Wyn‘s first time playing Liverpool with a full band behind her.

The great advantage to this was that I finally got to hear songs like the jangly Better of You, Jealousy, and her countrified indie-rock debut single Polaroid as they appear in their recorded form. I am glad to say that whether you see Megan Wyn as a solo acoustic artist or fully electric with a band you’ll have an equally enjoyable experience.

This show at Jimmy’s was part of Tom A. Smith‘s first tour as a headliner. He has already built up a glowing reputation as an emerging talent. He has quite the CV. He has played with The Mysterines, The Lathums, and Sam Fender; collaborated with Miles Kane; played Glastonbury; and supported Elton John at Hyde Park. He is only 18. Judging by his performance on the night he is only just getting warmed-up.

To the strains of Louis Armstrong‘s Wonderful World, pandering to the local crowd by wearing a John Lennon ‘New York City’ T-shirt Tom A. Smith entered the stage. His scintillating set started with Wolves, a modern indie tune with a retro 80’s pop-rock undercurrent. Smith’s lyrics referencing social care, broken families and disability demonstrate a social conscience and are expressed with real passion. Next up was the self examining, equally ardent Could I Live With Being Fake.

What struck me most as his set progressed was how seamlessly he and his band slipped between styles. Convince Yourself had the soulful angst of something by The Snuts. Toronto had peak Happy Mondays baggy break beats. The beautiful, solo performed Boltcutters had the poignancy of a Billy Bragg song. New song Like You Do had all the theatricality you would expect from a Miles Kane Collaboration. There was even space for a sentimental seasonal song – This Christmas Time – that left one audience member to declare, ‘You’ve got me crying here Tom’. You get the impression that there is nothing that Tom A. Smith and his band can’t do, and do it extremely well too.

Smith’s set concluded with Never Good Enough and Dragonfly, songs that encapsulate Smith’s root style – indie-guitar anthems – songs on a par with that purveyor of Hypersonic Missiles, and I’m sure Smith is heading on a similar trajectory to his North-Eastern compatriot.

Ian Dunphy.