26 November 2006 (gig)
02 December 2006
Seasick Steve is a bluesman and a performer of the highest calibre. Even before making an entrance he is able to get his audience to move closer to the stage, and, from this moment right up to the end he has everyone in the room enthralled. Early on, whilst waiting for a replacement guitar lead, he uses the broken one to great effect with a guitar pedal and vocal improvisations. This is finessed with the line 'as you get older you stop giving a shit about the mistakes'.
His music is blues through and through, the vocals are raw and the lyrics are an honest portrayal of his life as a 'bum'. But, not only is Seasick Steve an accomplished solo musical force he is a raconteur and his songs are interspersed with humorous anecdotes from his time hobo-ing as well as the odd swig from a bottle of JD and impromptu dialogues with hecklers.
In addition, Steve plays a variety of customised guitars and instruments including the 'Mississippi Drum Machine', a wooden box kicked to provide percussion, the 'Diddly-Bo', a one stringed instrument made from a plank, some old cans and a wire and the 3-stringed 'Trance Wonder'. The latter is a guitar with only 3 strings which was bought from a character called Sherman Cooper who, on Steve’s instructions, is ritually humiliated by the audience at every gig for having ripped him off.
This man really loves entertaining, his music is first class blues, his stories are great and his live show is not to be missed.
