Experience: 9/10

Venue: Ropetackle Centre, Shoreham

Date: Thursday 19th November 2015

We’d wanted to see this band for a while, and this concert, their furthest south in the British Isles, was an excellent opportunity. I got their first album last Christmas, and while their sound has matured – they’ve been together for ten years now – it was still good, raucous entertainment for a couple of hours.

They did a range of numbers from their decade of performing – their new CD is titled Decade – including a set of tunes from their early days as a four-piece ceilidh band, Teuch And Ginger. The Last Time was prefaced by a story of their cheating ex-manager, whose worst crime was to deny the band their sticky toffee puddings one evening as the gig’s start time was too close – they’ve never forgiven him for that. Fortunately, the catering at the Ropetackle is pretty good, and the bread and butter pudding on offer was much appreciated (we enjoyed it too).

Alec Dalglish, the guitarist, had a solo early in the second half, while Craig Espie, the fiddler, was featured soon afterwards with a tune called Angry Fiddler (comments about him never smiling raised a laugh). Their encore was called Path To Home, and gave almost everyone a chance to show off their skill, although Martin Gillespie seemed reluctant to join in. Never mind, we’d heard plenty of his piping during the evening, and I certainly enjoyed seeing such a strapping young man wearing a kilt – I suspect I wasn’t the only one.

There was even a young lady from their home town in the audience tonight, whose sister had asked them to play Home To Donegal especially for her; this addition to the set came shortly before the interval. They admitted it was unusual for most of the audience to be sitting for the entire performance, so they got us on our feet for the final (pre-encore) number, Put Your Hands Up, and even the older attendees joined in with enthusiasm. We purchased all of the CDs on offer as well as a bobble hat, and left very happy with our evening’s entertainment.

The set list: Rox Revival; Good To Go; Walk With Me; Clueless Wife; Can You Hear Us?; The Last Time (sticky toffee pudding story); Teuch and Ginger; Home To Donegal; Happy To Be Home – Interval – We Can Run; Moonraker (no connection to the film); Alec’s solo – didn’t catch the name; The Showman; Can’t Find The Cure; Angry Fiddler; The Rut; Put Your Hands Up

And as I mentioned earlier, the encore was Path To Home. Will definitely see this group again if we get the chance.

© 2015 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me