With Greg Kane
High Fade
Saturday 2nd November 7pm
Òran Mór
Formed in 2016, this young, proudly Celtic 3 piece band from Edinburgh play high energy funk/rock music. The band, guitarist/vocalist Harry Valentino, drummer/vocalist Calvin Davidson & bassist Oliver Sentance began life busking on the cobbled streets of our dear capital whilst at the same time paying their dues in the dive bars in and around the Old Town district. Wind forward 8 years and it’s now a full-time thing for all 3 of them… living the dream I guess! Think of them as having the theatrics of The Darkness, the precision of Vulfpeck mixed with the joy of Tenacious D and you’ll get pretty close to what High Fade are.
Curiously their accents often drift from East Coast Scotland to West Coast USA and back again, it does irk a bit, but somehow comes across as quite natural. After some research, I found out that they spend a lot of their time playing Stateside, so it’s having an effect. This music is fun, their audiences quickly ditch their inhibitions within the first few bars of their often overly intricate intros… and then they completely lose it when High Fade lay it down. This band works… and they work it hard.
Choice Track: High Fade – ‘Bone To Pick With You’
Steph Strings
Monday 4th November 7pm
Hug & Pint
Steph Strings is a 23 year-old guitarist/singer- songwriter from Melbourne, Australia. She is blessed with such iconic looks. She also exhibits a very calm and cool presence for one so young… very comfortable and confident when deciding not to sing, but just lay her guitar on her lap, using a slide to play her instrumental tunes in and around the more conventional lyrical offerings. But her words are anything but conventional, they are uplifting, thoughtful and engaging… mostly focusing on the random folk she’s encountered on her travels that merit a song. Her set of songs is like a diary… Australia sounds like a really fantastical place judging by the stories she tells. She is not the finished article yet, but I’ll wager that when she comes back to Glasgow, there’ll be many, many more people hanging on every word and every twang.
I’m smitten.
Choice Track: Steph Strings – ‘Wholesome Days’
Rachel Chinouriri
Tuesday 12th November 7pm
QMU
Rachel Chinouriri is a London born (to very strict Christian Zimbabwean parents) 24 year old singer/songwriter. During her time at high school she suffered endless bullying due to her being one of the very few black kids at a predominately white school. Chants of “Slave” and the N word was a daily episode for her. She surprisingly sights Coldplay as a major influence on her musical upbringings… their songs helped her thru these dark times. Hence, as she openly admits, she likes to play it safe musically.
But I don’t think she’s being entirely honest here… watching her onstage demeanour, although warm & welcoming, you feel there’s a threatening sub plot. PATREON megastar HTHAZE is an enthusiastic supporter, which doesn’t hurt. She’s out on tour promoting her debut album “What A Devastating Turn Of Events”. There’s something really special and distinct here. The way she uses her voice, the production of her songs, matched with her multi level personability… it all bodes well for Rachel Chinouriri, we should all be keeping an eye out for her.
Choice Track: Rachel Chinouriri – ‘All I Ever Asked’
