Now into its 15th year of operation Please Please You continues to bring the good people of York, Leeds and beyond some of the very best live music that is around today. This much is once again confirmed by looking at the York promoter’s early schedule for the New Year. It is yet another fabulous programme of the new and the old, the brave and the bold.
God Is In The TV has had a closer look at what lies ahead in the coming months and picked out just a few of the many highlights.
Please Please You’s live music year begins in earnest next Tuesday 4th February in the intimate surroundings of the 100 capacity Basement of York City Screen picture house. The Nashville, Tennessee-based singer, songwriter and guitarist Sam Lewis – a man dubbed ‘a modern Townes Van Zandt’ – will be playing here on the third date of his UK tour.
A couple of nights later it is over to Stockton-on-the-Forest – a small village a couple of miles north east of York – for what is quite a coup for Please Please You. Teaming up with Off The Beaten Track they are bringing no one less than Gruff Rhys to the local village hall. Not surprisingly tickets to see the Super Furry Animals’ frontman were snapped up in double-quick time and the show has long since sold out.
The month continues apace with Sorry appearing at the Fulford Arms in York, a 150 capacity venue dedicated to live music, the following Tuesday, the 11th of February. The London post-punk duo of Asha Louis and Lincoln Patrick – now augmented by Lincoln Barrett on drums, bassist Campbell Baum and Marco Pini on synths – have been on many people’s “ones-to-watch” radar for a while now. It should be a good ‘un.
The next night we are positively spoilt for choice and a difficult decision will have to be made whether or not to travel the 20-odd miles along the A64 to the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds to catch the brilliant Irish singer Lisa O’Neill or just stay put here in York to check out former Old Crow Medicine Show alumnus Gill Landry at the city’s wonderful Crescent Community Venue.
Having said that, if you do opt to stay in York on the 12th of February you will still have the option of going to see Lisa O’Neill in the city’s The Black Swan the next night.
By this time we are not even half way through February and the month still has much to offer, including shows at the Crescent from the young Irish singer-songwriter Junior Brother (in a special early show on the 15th) and a co-headlining event (on the 17th) featuring alternative British folkies Ye Vagabonds and Red River Dialect, not to mention a couple of dates from that great Los Angeles rock’n’roll band GospelbeacH first at Manchester’s Soup Kitchen on the 27th and then at the Fulford Arms the very next night.
Looking even further ahead on the Please Please You gig calendar you will see another band who are flying high in the hotly-tipped sky; London post-punk five-piece Squid. Their debut album Town Centre got a mighty 9/10 rating on these very pages last September. And it will come as little surprise to those in the know that their show at the Crescent on the 18th of March sold out pretty sharpish.
There are still tickets left for a number of the other Please Please You events, though, including Pictish Trail, Nadia Reid (her stunning performance at the Fulford Arms three years back still lingers long in the memory), and in a joint promotion with Let’s Go Baboon, the maverick folk musician Richard Dawson.
A full list of all of Please Please You’s forthcoming shows can be found HERE
