The UK’s live music industry remains in a parlous state. Decimated by the initial impact of the coronavirus and the subsequent lockdown when all live music venues were forced to close their doors, the industry continues to be severely buffeted by the country’s ongoing cost of living crisis, soaring production costs, and Brexit red tape. In terms of revenue, the industry is now a third smaller than it was before the pandemic, a position not helped by many artists having to cancel tours because they simply can no longer afford to play.
Against this background of severely debilitating financial pressures, a hard core of independent promoters, grassroots venues, associated staff and volunteers continue to bring us the thrill of the live music experience. Here in York we owe a huge debt of gratitude to local promoters such as Please Please You and Ouroboros, and venues like The Crescent Community Venue and the Fulford Arms. 25 miles away in Leeds similar thanks has to be extended to Brudenell Presents, Brudenell Social Club, and Hyde Park Book Club for their equally unwavering commitment to this cause. And the Howard Assembly Room in Leeds is another performance venue that maintains a rich and varied programme of events in what are consistently straitened fiscal circumstances.
Despite all of this uncertainty in the industry and the ongoing difficulties it continues to face, 2022 still managed to produce many magical live music moments. In a year during which I attended a total of 42 concerts and nine festivals, I have whittled down literally scores and scores of individual performances to what is my personal top twelve for the year.
I have listed them in chronological order:
The Natvral – Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds, 21/04/2022
My own gig year took a while to properly ignite, but here it really did catch fire. Kip Berman, once of the American indie-pop band The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, was by now flying solo as The Natvral. The fact that no more than a couple of dozen folks ventured into this delightful live music and arts space on that Thursday night back in April probably tells us much about the aforementioned problems facing artists and venues alike. Those of us lucky enough to be there, though, were blown away by a majorly talented dude who could have been playing to a crowd of a few thousand such was his energy and engagement on the night.
Jake Xerxes Fussell – The Fulford Arms, York, 09/05/2022
In marked contrast to The Natvral show, this one had long-since sold out and The Fulford Arms – rightly self-described as “more than just a pub” – is packed out for the arrival of Jake Xerxes Fussell, the folklorist from North Carolina who transported archival tunes from his American past to the present day.
Tord Gustavsen Trio – Howard Assembly Room, Leeds, 21/05/2022
Less than a fortnight later and it is another music in a different concert hall. A Norwegian jazz pianist and composer with his trio mined the rich seams of classical and folk music in the splendid surroundings of a beautifully restored concert venue with its barrel vaulted ceiling, gothic motifs and arched windows. What more could you ask for?
Grace Jones – KITE Festival, Oxfordshire, 11/06/2022
Only once before in more than 50 years of gig going have I felt that I was in the presence of some otherworldly artistic being. That occasion was when I witnessed David Bowie appear to levitate onto the stage at Leeds Town and Country Club in 1997. This was to be the second such time as Grace Jones made her entrance as the headline act at the inaugural KITE festival to the sound of ‘Nightclubbing’. I swear she is not of this earth and to be that close to her was as surreal as it was wildly disconcerting.
Lady Blackbird – Mostly Jazz, Funk & Soul Festival, Birmingham, 10/07/2022
That Sunday afternoon, it was hotter than hell and Lady Blackbird arrived in a heat haze as if teleported from her native Los Angeles and the Golden Age of Hollywood. Outsized in glamour and sophistication, she was spectacular, exuding an intimacy and emotion which was barely credible given that it took place in a public park a couple of miles south of Birmingham city centre.
The Delines – Pocklington Arts Centre, 13/07/2022 and Howard Assembly Room, Leeds, 09/11/2022
You don’t have the undoubted privilege of catching Portland, Oregon’s The Delines for more than three years and when you do get the chance to see them again it happens twice within four months. Both of these shows get the most honourable of mentions because, in truth, you couldn’t put a cigarette paper between just how good each one of them was. They were equally emotive, equally atmospheric, and equally superb.
Teenage Fanclub – Doune The Rabbit Hole Festival, Stirlingshire, 17/07/2022
In 2018 and having spent nearly 30 years together, Teenage Fanclub and one of their three founding members, Gerard Love, went their separate ways. With his departure the band lost its melodic heartbeat and also, some would even argue, its way. Their headline appearance on the last night at Doune The Rabbit Hole in their Scottish homeland confirmed any such reports were clearly exaggerated. Bolstered by the recruitment of two Welshmen for this show – Euros Child and Sweet Baboo – the Celtic connection proved to be irresistible as they put in a performance as good as any I had seen from them in three decades.
Arooj Aftab – Green Man Festival, Wales, 21/08/2022
Many of this year’s Green Man highlights were to be found tucked away in the festival’s Walled Garden. Adwaith, Bess Atwell, Marisa Anderson & William Tyler, and Ural Thomas & the Pain all spring readily to mind, but the best of all surely had to be Arooj Aftab. Sung predominantly in her native Urdu, Aftab’s music embraced jazz, ambient, Persian folk, Hindustani classical, and South Asian poetry. It was spellbinding, her musical magnetism merely magnified by her delicious line in self-deprecating humour.
Beth Orton – Brudenell Social Club, Leeds, 16/10/2022
Beth Orton consolidated the critical and commercial success of her eighth studio album, Weather Alive, by embarking upon a sold-out tour of the United Kingdom, the last date of which was to be in West Yorkshire. Orton clearly still had plenty of creative petrol left in her tank by the time that she had reached Leeds. Backed by her impressive band, the former Brit Award winner and two-time Mercury Prize nominee scaled the heights of yet another career high by delivering a stunning show.
Bob Dylan – London Palladium, 24/10/2022
Of the 21 previous times that I had seen Bob Dylan in concert, his performances could, roughly speaking, be divided into two broad categories – distinctly average (pretty much all of his Arena shows in the first decade of this millennium) and absolutely brilliant (most everything else from Blackbushe Festival in 1978 to Hyde Park in London, three years ago). This 22nd occasion fell firmly into the latter. Dylan may well now be 81 years of age but thankfully the man who almost single-handedly revolutionised the face of contemporary music nearly six decades ago, continues to defy expectations, time, and place.
Julia Holter: The Passion of Joan of Arc – Huddersfield Town Hall, 23/11/2022
Julia Holter is a wonderfully inventive American composer, singer, and songwriter. The Passion of Joan of Arcis a 1928 French silent film commonly regarded as a masterpiece of that genre. At this long-awaited world premiere of Holter’s live soundtrack to the film where she was joined by her band and the 36-strong Chorus of Opera North, these two prime examples of cultural expressionism combined to quite mesmerising effect.
Jesca Hoop – Howard Assembly Room, Leeds, 04/12/2022
Christmas was creeping ever closer but enough time still remained in 2022 for Jesca Hoop to pull a final rabbit out of the gigs-of-the-year hat. There was to be no smoke, no mirrors, nor no sleight of hand. The American musician now domiciled in Manchester just popped over the Pennines and decided to put on a bewitching show that was as strange, subversive, charming, and utterly compelling, as it was most refreshingly unique.
A number of other excellent gigs, concerts, and festival appearances that took place in 2022 are also worthy of mention:
Elanor Moss (The Citadel, York), Kevin Morby (Wide Awake Festival), Katie Malco (Brudenell Social Club, Leeds), Yard Act (Deer Shed Festival), John Francis Flynn (Deer Shed Festival and Moseley Folk & Arts Festival), Bill Callahan (Brudenell Social Club, Leeds), Jane Weaver (The Crescent, York).
Photos: Simon Godley