Tonight sees the city’s star promoter EVOL brings together two of the biggest names on the Liverpool live scene; they have been working with both bands throughout each upgraded venue on their respective upwards trajectories, both looking to breakout of just this local scene and set their sights further across the nation.
The Heavy North, fresh from releasing their first two albums, 2022’s debut Electric Soul Machine and 2023’s follow-up Delta Shakedown as well as a concert movie (plus soundtrack) filmed in Liverpool last year and premiered at cinemas recently, and Casino, who having supported The Zutons on their tour earlier in the year and who are about to go back out on the road with The Lightning Seeds.
So it’s no surprise that we are in one of the bigger rooms that Liverpool has to offer, but unlike a large percentage of current local bands there’s no bland indie-pop here tonight. There’s a variety of sounds on offer, the dive bar blues of THN and the (Northern) soulful leanings of the headliner.
8:30 sees The Heavy North stride on stage and start with a couple of tracks from their debut (where the majority of their set tonight will be taken from) – ‘The Genie‘ and ‘Darkness In Your Eyes’ – and it’s obvious that they have gone for a set from the more funky end of their canon to match the mood of the night. They are clearly appreciative of the fact that the healthy crowd have assembled early, with ‘Delta Shakedown’ receiving the first clap-along of the evening.
The addition tonight of two extra voices onstage in the form of their backing singers fleshes out an already strong vocal performance from frontman Kenny Stuart, who tells us there’s not much time for chat as they’ve got more songs to cram into their allotted half hour slot.
The glorious harmonica-led stomp of ‘To The Wind I Go’ , followed by bluesy closer ‘As Long As You’re Here With Me’ sees them leave the stage to rapturous applause, and having seen them a handful of times over the last couple of years it’s the first time that I’ve properly ‘got it’ with the set showing off their considerable talent as well as they have ever done previously.
Half past nine sees Casino take to their biggest Liverpool stage thus far – tonight filled with lampshades – and fly straight into the latest single which is receiving some big radio airplay, ‘Heaven’, before ‘Love Goes On’ is greeted with a now-jigging crowd.
“This is what Northern Soul sounds like played by scousers after 10 pints of Guinness” is how the as-yet-unreleased ‘Visions’ is introduced and it’s obvious that a summer full of playing festivals around the country has turned them into such a polished outfit, far out-performing their years and experience. And by now the Friday night audience have warmed to their task, singing along with last year’s single ‘By Your Side’.
There’s then a change of pace with singer Dillon playing solo on ‘Never Let This Feeling Die’, before the band returns for the highlight of the evening, the gospel-y ‘Father I Stand’, which if they release it will see them become mainstream, being so different to what else is out there. And when this is followed by their finest released single to date ‘Then It Hit Me‘, then it becomes quite the goose-bump inducing double-salvo.
Newbie ‘Everybody Get Up’ sees them go disco, which contains a stunning vocal as well as a cheesy, seamless introduction of the band, before we get that bit of any new act’s show, the seemingly unnecessary cover version, but they even pull that off with aplomb. It’s a great version of The Clash’s ‘Rock The Casbah’, which in their hands is no time-filling exercise (in fact, considering they only have a handful of singles out, they fill their hour superbly), it even adds to the timeworn original.
They end with a trio of already released stuff, ‘Let Me Down’, ‘Fever’ and the Stevie Wonder-esque closer ‘Back In The Day’, and then they are gone. Having seen a lot of more experienced bands never get to this level, their first big hometown gig is quite the statement. And having seen The Lightning Seeds also live recently, then Ian Broudie should be having sleepless nights worrying about the prospect of being blown off stage every night. I would be stunned if they weren’t the next band from these parts to make it big.
