Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Geoffrey Chaucer neglected to tell one story when penning the grand uncle of English Literature classics, the Tale of Alison Green.
Much debt is owed to The Canterbury Set of musicians who made their mark on certain specific genres over the years, the history of the Kent City, nestling deep as the spiritual home of the country and offering a path to pilgrims over the century and as place which once visited should never be forgotten. Now add all these reasons together and intensify them with a young musician by the name of Alison Green and you have all the ingredients of powerful sonnet or lengthy adoring poem in which the writer would have been proud to have placed somewhere between The Wife of Bath’s Tale and the upstanding Knights Tale.
Sundays, for many over the age of 40, used to be a day in which really not much would happen. You might wake up at some point having heard the paperboy manfully shove papers twice the size of a small family car through your letterbox, for the religious the journey to the local church might be in order and for the rest of the day, it would be have dinner, snooze a while and then wonder where life had gone wrong. Thankfully now at least we can always leave the house and find entertainment in which to prove life is worth witnessing. For anybody making their way to The Cavern Club on the Sunday as part of the International Pop Overthrow, those days of unremitting boredom are no longer part of the equation.
Even before Ms. Green started off her set, you could this was a woman enamoured by the sound of a great tune and to see her mouthing gently the words to The Monkees track I’m A Believer, would have gladdened the heart to see her smile broadly as she did so.
Her own set was just wonderful to watch. The combination of whimsy and well played guitar, topped off with a voice that struck deep into the heart, not in fear as many would do but in total absolute search for musical truth. The way to a listener’s heart is sometimes not taken by grinding them up against a wall but with the flash of shy smile whilst delivering songs that resonate serenity and a touch of humour, the notion of leading by the hand rather than the command is one to be commended.
Ms. Green opened her set with Heart Tattoo, a lovely piece of guitar work which set the seal almost immediately on what to expect throughout the half hour set. With tracks such as the enjoyable Whisky and Cigarettes, the intriguing All You Make Me Feel Is Blue, the superb Herbert Finnegan and Unscripted Art House Play and Take Me Home making everybody watching feel something stir deep inside themselves, something tangible and authentic. The shy smile is as honest as they come but underneath that beats the heart of a lyrical lioness, of a woman not afraid to wink at the audience through the power of an acoustic ballad and yet still growl when the time is right.
The Tale of Allson Green is one that needs to continue, the lyrics must not be silenced as if being spoken by a ridiculed Monk but loudly and with great abandon by a woman of stature.
Alison Green is a Canterbury story of musical heroism in which it was an honour to witness being performed in Liverpool’s Cavern Club.
Ian D. Hall