Spice Of Life Open Mic, Take 2

Well, I survived my second open mic at the Spice of Life! This week the standard was definitely not as high as last time. That's not to diminish the fact that each and every one of the performers had the guts to stand up and put their thing 'out there'. I was actually surprised how much focus this week was on the 'singer/songwriter' side of the fence as opposed to 'musician'.

Okay, so I actually took heart in the fact that one artist only knew 3 open chord shapes, changing key between songs by moving a capo up the neck. Unfortunately, with most of the acts, the singer/songwriter side fell short, too.

There were noteable exceptions including:

A duo called Maisy's Wake (pictured above), doing the two guitar harmony thing with one of them channelling Paul McCartney's look from the Sgt. Pepper days.

A cheeky chappie calling himself 'Tom on the Guitar'. He played really well, but did the 'showman' thing a bit too much for me, dangerously leaning towards cabaret.

Some guy over from San Fran who I didn't want to like... but I did. Kinda acoustic Neil Youngish... kinda not...

The standout performance for me was by a guy called Bobby Long. Charismatic stage presence, vocally think 'Ray LaMontagne' meets the wideboy character Noel (played by Tom Hardy) in the movie "Scenes of a Sexual Nature" (2006). Young. Given half a chance I think the boy might make it. He has a MySpace page here.

I won't be able to make the next Monday night offering, but on Tuesday 30th January they're premiering a monthly best-of-the-best evening at the Hard Rock Cafe which I hope to go along to. I don't think I'll be eating the food! Given my schedule it may be that these meetings may be the only ones I can make in the near future.