Review of 'The Big Sing' featuring GU4/Steve Thomason at the Grand Union Folk Club, Monday, 14th July, 2008

We went to Grand Union Folk Club Monday last with high expectations – and were not disappointed. It's an older crowd, in the main, strictly Old School down the line vocalising tonight, no instrumental accompaniments. And none the worse for that – the title of the gig was 'The Big Sing,' after all... And they do not sing any bigger than here – a club noted for its audience's vocal talents, where performers are always buttressed mightily on the choruses and harmonies by the power, passion and depth of feeling round the room. A democracy of voices, indeed, that frequently blurs the distinctions between guest and audience. As tonight: the billed acts, GU4 and Steve Thomason, come out of the rotating floorsingers in an organic move, tall waves rising and falling into a rich sea of sound to create a seamless evening's music. The gamut of the Tradition was on display – from songs of the sea to songs of the land, songs of work, sport and pleasure. Tough times to good times, with what I have previously termed 'The Arc of Loss' inherent in the hard-dogged, problematic journey of our island music as it moved through the various revivals to the present day somewhat backstepped tonight. For this was a joyous celebration, sung out with fire, emotion and at times ferocity, a night where it would be unfair to single out any individual performers. In their own various ways they were all good – and it is rare that I would make that statement, given my often ambivalent relationship to the tradition down the years. Rather than empty gesture, channels were opened to the past, creating a autonomous zone where, for a couple of hours and a small effort of imagination, you stepped outside of time to experience the link to long dead ages and manners. A democracy of voices – not in the sense of a flattened-out banality but an area where the stronger aided the weaker to attain some rather wonderful aural grace, however brief the duration. You might gather we had a damn good time...

Noted in passing: GU4 now have a MySpace site here... which gives a small flavour of their music... and oddly enough, for such a quintessentially English musical bash, it was Bastille Day, Le Quatorze Juillet... Marchons, Marchons...