As a rule, I give support acts a wide berth, but I am kicking myself that I caught only the last two numbers of William the Conqueror’s set on Tuesday, supporting Danny and the Champions of the World at the Brudenell.
They sounded great and clearly had done so from the get-go, gauging by the applause and encouragement of the smaller than usual audience. (Few, it seemed, had been prepared to brave the evening’s wild winds and scything rain to be there. No matter. Their loss.)
This being the first night of a fifteen date UK tour, lead singer Danny Wilson is making some last minute checks before he and the rest of the band takes to the tiny Brudenell stage.
His acoustic guitar looks as if it has been in an encounter with a grizzly bear, it is so gouged and battered. There is a puncture wound where no puncture wound should be. I am reminded about the story of Lee Perry telling Mick Jones of The Clash to play the guitar ‘with a fist of steel.’
With his straw-weave trilby hat and beard, floral shirt and prison yard tattoos, Wilson is the hipster Matt Bianco. His voice is another matter entirely: Desire-era Dylan, Van Morrison, The Boss, John Fogerty, each can be detected in Wilson’s impressively seductive holler. When he speaks, it is a surprise that it is with an estuary London accent.
‘Is everyone alright?’ he calls, as the audience recovers from the brilliant pummelling of opening numbers Let the Water Wash Over You and Consider Me, both culled from gospel-tinged new album Brilliant Light. He says this rather lot. He jokes about saying it. There is an easy rapport between band and audience. A toast to American musician Paul Williams falls flat. “Yeah. Right!” growls Wilson in agreement. “Fuck Paul Williams!”
Flanking Wilson tonight, legs slightly agape and shouldering his Gibson Les Paul like it was a machine-pistol, guitarist Paul Lush powers through song after song, chasing down the voodoo in ever coruscating figures. He defers now and then to a bank of effects pedals before him at his feet. His playing alternates between lush chiming chords and edgy staccato. He is the love-child of Keith Richards and Wilko Johnson. My ears are still ringing two days later…
During Long Distance Tears, the band are joined onstage unexpectedly by a woman from the audience. She dances mock go-go fashion before vacating the stage as unexpectedly as she arrived, prompting Wilson to lead the crowd through a sing along of Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark. “It’ll probably never happen again,” he laments.
Despite being packed cheek by jowl on the tiny stage, Danny and the Champs are exhilerated and clearly enjoying themselves. Drummer Steve Brookes and bassist Chris Clarke shift gears instinctively, fully attuned to one another’s thinking. Keyboard player Free Jazz Geoff throws in swirls of organ, running his elbow up and down the keys for added colour, while on pedal steel, Henry Senior whips up some deep-fried Americana.
Songs from Brilliant Light are playfully reworked, milked for propulsive energy. Fan fave, Restless Feet, is squeezed and stretched beyond the confines of its recorded counterpart. The band throw themselves into the howling psychedelic wig-out like some freak chapter of the Allman Brothers. The horn-soaked Southern soul boogie of the album, here gives way across the evening to a sharper, shinier beast. It is a thrilling metamorphosis.
After the last of the encore numbers has melted away – a brilliant Every Beat – it is out into the rain and the cold of a September night in Leeds. I am immune. I glow like that kid in the 70s Ready Brek commercials: Danny and the Champions of the World, Purveyors of Marvellous Medicine…
Danny and The Champions of the World play Manchester’s Soup Kitchen tonight. Tour continues. Details here. Brilliant Light is available on Loose.