By Greg Kane
Michael McGovern
Sunday 17th May 7pm
Òran Mór
oran-mor.co.uk
I broke my heart listening to this song… ‘I heard you got married, I heard you ruined your life. I closed the book on us for the final time…’. These are the opening lines of young East Kilbride born singer songwriter Michael McGovern’s heart wrenching song ‘Evelyn’.
He describes his sound as warm music with him often inhabiting other people’s stories when it comes to the subject matter of his storytelling songs. As many do in this genre he cites Bob Dylan as a major influence.
He’s out promoting his second album ‘Thin White Road’.
Choice Track: ‘Evelyn’
Blü Eyes
Tuesday 19th May 7pm
Poetry Club
swg3.tv
To unapologetically state that you play pop music is a risky move. But I tip my hat to you Katie Stump (aka Blü Eyes). I like pop music too and your take on it is ambitious, beautifully performed and exquisitely produced.
Katie Stump is from Orange County, California. She has been releasing music since 2013 and started using the pseudonym Blü Eyes in 2022. She sights Taylor Swift as one of her main influences (it doesn’t get more pop). Like most pop people she has a team behind her, but she regards herself as an ‘Artist Project’ rather than a solo artist. She is a prolific songwriter too, on her own or as part of teams of writers and decides if she keeps her songs for her Artist Project or lets them be pitched to other Artist Projects. I guess this is how modern pop music works nowadays. I feel old.
Choice track: ‘You’d Never Know’
quickly, quickly
Tuesday 26th May 7.30pm
The Hug & Pint
thehugandpint.com
Graham Johnson is a 25-year-old from Portland Oregon. He’s been playing piano since he was only two years old and making beats and posting them up to Soundcloud since he was around 12. He is now an acclaimed multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter and producer. He describes his music as lofi beats to study to.
He first started releasing music as ‘quickly, quickly’ in 2017 and has gone through many musical evolutions over the last nine years finding himself now out promoting his fourth album ‘I Heard That Noise’. This is one of the best records I’ve heard in a long, long time. It’s intimate, intricate, intimidating, intriguing, inventive, impressive and the production and sound design is off the scale imaginative. He puts that down to the highly competitive world of beat making.
Choice Track: ‘Enything’
