Review: Tenille Townes, The Fleece – ‘She has gravel in her throat and dirt under her fingernails’

On a beautifully clear October night, there were two bands, both female fronted, and both showing a different side of whatever it is that modern country music does these days.

Twinnie is high gloss and sparkles. She is soft-country-pop blasted in from the mid 90s, powered by MTV. She is slick as all hell and, it seems, that no song is complete without at least two hooks.

For a support act she’s pretty damn remarkable; the capacity crowd are singing along, indulging in some syncopated clapping, way before the end of the rabble-rousing opener, Welcome to the Club.

During the course of her short, thirty minute, set Twinnie delivers song after song that, thirty years ago, could have been massive Atlantic-straddling megahits. Now they sound a bit like an incredibly high-definition English photocopy of something from a time past.

If Twinnie isn’t exactly the real thing then Tenille Townes is as authentic, genuine and honest as country singers get. There’s no fuss, no frills, no mucking about, just a voice that would stop cattle and songs that tug at those heart strings. She’s proper country or, at least, proper country-tinged pop rock.

The last time this Canadian singer-songwriter was over in the UK she grabbed a main stage spot at the C2C festival and smashed it to bits.

Her rough-edged rockers, mostly taken from her latest album The Lemonade Stand, are seemingly custom tooled for big spaces. If this evening is anything to go by, they work pretty well in small spaces too.

An acoustic, solo opener, Where You Are, soon gives way to full band, full blown country rocking. There are only three of them but there’s serious power there; an insistent acoustic strum, some flashy guitar hero moments and solid percussion with plenty of truckstop harmonies.

Both White Horse and Same Road Home inspire hair flinging from Townes, testing the impressive range of her voice. She has gravel in her throat and dirt under her fingernails.

Where Twinnie looks back to the glossy MTV generation, Townes casts an eye right back to classic blues-y country rock. There’s a bit of Janis Joplin there, something timeless, something ageless.

It’s not all guitar bashing rock though, both When I Meet My Maker and Jersey on the Wall are tender and questioning. The gravel voice toned down to a gentle, thoughtful communication with a higher being; she is humble and grateful. Both are the sort of song that could easily take their place in the Nashville canon.

As the set ends, Townes and her band gallop through one upbeat stormer after another. Country radio hit, The Girl Who Didn’t Care, does female empowerment properly while Somebody’s Daughter is a huge crowd pleaser.

Sandwiched between those two are Holding Out for the One and Melissa Etheridge’s I’m the Only One. Both are simply good-time, unabashed country rockers. No fuss, no pretence, just the sort of music you want to hear live. The sort of music that makes you feel better.

As the last chords of Somebody’s Daughter rang out a guy in the audience turned and, to no one in particular, said “Well, that was bloody good”. After an incredible encore of the Etta James classic At Last, complete with glorious vocal fireworks, nobody was in the mood to argue with him.

Main photo: Darren C Photography

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• Brand new late night venue to open this Halloween

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