Gig Report: Ray Lamontagne

Date: Wednesday 17 October, 9.00pm

Venue: Manchester Apollo Theatre

Face Value: £18.50

Support Act: Sarabeth something

Gig buddy: Phil

Oh dear, I'm loathe to even report this gig, it was one of the poorest I've been to in a while..

We arrived at one of our favourite venues (Apollo) in enough time to grab a drink (I'm still on the soft variety) and settle in our seats for the support act who is a dreary sounding singer-songwriter type. I wondered whether I was too harsh in saying that she sounded like Beth Orton in a coma. That is until Phil narrows his eyes, shakes his head and says "ooooh, she's not THAT good".

Fine, support act over and Ray takes the stage without any fuss and begins to play. His voice everything we had hoped for and the sound (we're directly behind the mixing desk) is perfect. Sadly, that's about as positive as I can be about the evening. With no stage set to add interest to the show, the focus is on the artist who is barely distinguishable from the rest of the band (he's hardly even facing his audience) - in fact it feels more like we've wandered into a rehearsal. 5 songs in and he remembers to introduce the band, but barely any acknowledgement to the crowd that have paid nearly £20 a head to see him. Given the current climate where artists are making more money from touring than album sales (thanks largely to the piracy and cheap downloads available) it would be nice if there was a little gratitude.

Now, I'm a big fan of a little variation on the album and other than a heavy steel guitar inserted into most tracks (which was SUPER annoying) there was no discernable difference vocally - in fact we wished we stayed home and put his two CDs on shuffle.

The other issue with the gig was that it was fully seated - this did not help build any atmosphere whatsoever (in the complete absence of any on stage), so instead of grooving away, we were politely sitting in our seats like it was a royal variety performance. Mind you, with the excessive steel guitar, I worry that people might have started line dancing. I was almost glad when the set ended - and slightly annoyed that the delay for encore was a little protracted. This may have been a common feeling as many people had begun to leave after the first encore even though the house lights had not come up - yep, a second encore was on the way. (Why!!? Could he not tell that a funeral parlour has more atmosphere than his gig!?)

Overall: Miss this gig - total snoozefest! The most interesting part of the gig was that the drummer was wearing a bowler hat... enough said. Perhaps Miss Tunstall will show us the way on Friday night.. Stay tuned!

Rating: 2 guitars