Photo: Justin Edwards

Lee Fielding opens late to a sparse crowd seemingly more interested in pool than his hillbilly folk murder ballads. Unfortunately, his very short set, complete with mortifying on-stage banter, doesn’t change anyone’s mind – a shame, because he can actually pick a mean gee-tar and banjo.

The Kindness Of Strangers are another proposition – their blend of blues, country and MOR rock is inexplicably captivating. Perhaps it’s singer Brigitte’s perfectly-controlled voice – or maybe it’s her outfit, which impressively looks like something Stevie Nicks gave to the Salvos in the great wardrobe clean-out of ’88.

When Vashti Bunyan opens, she plays with a kind of humbled awe – a sort of doe-eyed amazement that people actually came to listen – and the crowd instantly loves her for it. Her set, mostly songs from her début Just Another Diamond Day, is interspersed with autobiographical anecdotes. Gareth Dickson and multi-instrumentalist Jo Mango accompany her fragile voice with suitable restraint, but they shine when invited by Bunyan to perform their own material. Bunyan appeals because her music offers a direct view of the late 60s – unlike her contemporaries, scarred by the cocaine-fuelled excesses of the 80s, or her neo-folk successors, whose music is inevitably marked by postmodernity. Only a return tour will tell if Bunyan can keep her touchingly naïve optimism in the face of her growing celebrity.

CHAD PARKHILL

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