Paul Buchanan At Vicar St

Paul Buchanan (of The Blue Nile) played in Vicar St last night and I was fortunate enough to get my hands on a ticket. It was without a doubt one of the best gigs that I have ever been to.

Vicar St is a great venue - there are lots of small tables on the ground floor, three sections of slightly elevated seats along the left, right and back walls and a balcony above with seating along all three walls.

The atmosphere was very warm and intimate. Most of the people there were middle aged and drinking endless bottles of wine. Paul chose coffee and honey as his drink for the evening.

When he came out on stage he was quite subdued but he warmed up after a few tunes and was actually very engaging and very funny. He responded well to the good natured heckles and had lots of little quips throughout the gig. The best one was, after forgetting some of the words to an earlier song, he commented that he was sure he wouldn't remember all the words to the next song. He decided to put his glasses on and read the lyrics off of a pile of papers he had beside him on stage. He asked "how do I look in these specs?" And then said that his tour was actually being sponsored by SpecSavers. He then said "they asked me to remind you that if you buy one pair, then you get the second pair free" to loads of laughter and applause.

The stage was a very simple set up - just the instruments and a blue curtain placed behind the band. The lighting was also simple, consisting of blue, green, red & yellow lights. But they were used effectively and complimented all of the songs that were played.

The band consisted of 6 members but only one of them (the bass player) was one of the members of The Blue Nile. Paul's voice is fantastic and the band actually sounded as good (and at times) better than they have on record.

The Blue Nile formed in Glasgow in the early 80s and over the course of two decades have only released four albums: A Walk Across The Rooftops (1984), Hats (1989), Peace At Last (1996) and High (2004). Their music has been described as '4am songs', consisting of lush, atmospheric pop combined with velvety vocals and minimalist arrangements creating sublime and heartfelt songs. I couldn't agree more. Every bit of that came across in the live performance.

The set list for the night was:

01. Over The Hillside
02. Happiness
03. She Saw The World
04. I Would Never
05. Because Of Toledo
06. Heatwave
07. Saturday Night
08. Runaround Girl (New Song)
09. A Walk Across The Rooftops
10. Tinsel Town In The Rain
11. Easter Parade
12. Start Again (New Song)
13. Meanwhile (New Song)
14. Sentimental Man
15. Downtown Lights
---------------------------
16. High
17. Strangers In The Night

One other funny note: I was having a pint with my mate Mark before the gig when he said that we would probably see some famous people during the night.

After he returned a few minutes later from a quick look around he said, "I knew I would see someone. I just saw Luka Bloom."

To which I replied, "Oh really? I have no idea who she is."

Mark laughed and said, "That is pure quality! She is a man. Luka is Christy Moore's brother!"

We had a good laugh over that one...