Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
History has a habit of colliding with the present day. Existence it seems is all about the small quirks of fate that lead a person from one place to the next and then an overlap, the brief spill into the past and an action from your childhood is bought back into plain site and a small forgotten memory lingers causing a reflection and possibly a smile.
For Kathryn Williams, making a welcome and important return to her native Liverpool, performing for a packed crowd in the upstairs room at Leaf must have felt like the very best homecoming, the type that in America would see, at the very least, a ticker tape parade and an army of cleaners armed with brushes and a permanent scowl following closely behind. Ms Williams shared with the audience that as a child her father ran the shop downstairs and in the shadows that the now cosy candlelight provided she used to jump into piles of coats, ever self-defacing, she wondered if she could do it now without killing somebody.
It was the kind of recollection that makes listening to Kathryn Williams so immensely enjoyable, the chance to understand the melancholy that resides in the appearance and entity of time. For time is surely what her latest album Crown Electric is playing with, the thoughts of history influencing the concepts of the moment and for each recollection, for each wonderfully placed song, Leaf and the fans who sat in silent awe played their part by feeding Ms. Williams the energy to let the defences come tumbling down and perform as if each person in the room could see history collide.
This was a true night in which to savour, a night in which even if there was no new album, the tracks played would have still resonated with everyone. This down to Earth woman, a woman unafraid to use the vocabulary of a seasoned and well-rounded Human Being took the crowd through images that could have been witnessed by their own eyes but for whom Ms. Williams own superb perspective captured with grace and nostalgic appreciation. Tracks such as Underground, the fantastic Heart Shaped Box, the sense of creative space and need to be heard that rolls through the mind of Little Black Numbers and Monday Morning all echoed with the sound of past glories, loves and the desire to somehow keep the past firmly in sight, to make sure that the memories never once escaped and filtered away like water being casually pouring away down a crack in the pavement.
Sequins, the co-recorded track with the great Ed Harcourt, making a wonderful addition to the evening, it was perhaps with surprise that the very final song of the evening fell to the playing of a cover to bow out to. However if you are going to play a cover, if you are going to make a statement of intent, change the song, make it completely yours and that is exactly what Ms. Williams did as with the intenseness and skill afforded to someone of exceptional ability and a voice in which the soul feels safe in, she took Bruce Springsteen’s classic track Dancing In The Dark and made it so perfect a song that it took on completely new life. The slowness of the approaching words, the feel of the last gasping of air by someone pleading with humanity to understand that music needs to be nurtured and not abused by people who believe that an artist’s work is not worthy of even paying for was captured in all the emotion and passion that could ever be asked for.
This stunning set closer was a moment in which the image of the past came full circle and the night became one of its own again, the images Ms. Williams must have seen from the stage will forever be unknown to the audience as she thought back to her childhood days in Liverpool, but the music, the sound of the night will forever be pleasing and hauntingly beautiful to all who made their way to Leaf.
Ian D. Hall