Black Country, New Road, Glasgow review: 'intriguingly slippery'
The tricky-to-define sextet find the sweet spot between folk, indie and jazz, writes Fiona Shepherd
Black Country, New Road, Queen’s Park Arena, Glasgow ★★★
Cambridge-born, London-bred outfit Black Country, New Road are an intriguingly slippery proposition. With a line-up comprising six singing multi-instrumentalists, their musical possibilities are endless and they could never be accused of playing it safe, folding in a host of genre influences to a catalogue which finds the sweet spot between folk, indie and jazz.
With the departure of founding lead singer Isaac Wood in 2022, they have emerged as an even more democratic proposition. The charming harmonies of the female band members was the first sound to resonate around the harsh concrete amphitheatre that is Queen’s Park Arena, and nuanced massed vocals emerged as one of the signatures of a set which was almost exclusively drawn from their most recent album, Forever Howlong.
Bassist Tyler Hyde (daughter of Underworld’s Karl Hyde) was first to take the lead, her light, lovely tone tripping across the lyrics on Strangers, the band’s contribution to the Help(2) charity compilation. Like much of their material, its deceptive delicacy gave way to a meatier rock symphony with saxophone and mandolin layered into the arrangement.
Changing their tune again, they moved on to the indie vaudeville of The Big Spin. Some tracks were more a mellow trilling vibe than a robust song, some converted to galloping drama, others never moved beyond acoustic noodling.
There were cheers for a saxophone part which embarked on a minimalist odyssey with Nymanesque overtones. Besties, one of their more banging tunes, began with a baroque keyboard flourish. But their cover of Wings’ Band on the Run was a far better showcase of where to take harmonies and a multi-part structure.
Hyde then passed the lead vocals to keyboard player May Kershaw for the second half of the set, when they eventually unleashed the theatrical prog potential of the ensemble to much exaltation from the crowd.
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