VV Brown
Scala
27.11.08
Pushing through the doors to the Scala, it was a shock to see the venue already packed out. Having seen VV Brown‘s name around quite a lot of late, it shouldn’t have been that much of a shock, and after a couple of songs, the shock had dissipated completely.
The Londoner has a voice that will no doubt be lazily compared to Amy Winehouse, but, with the help of her animated backing group, Brown raised the roof with her soulful tones, finishing up with a swinging track which she then turned into a reggae anthem to leave the crowd baying for more. It is easy to see why she is getting all the hype, she’s surely destined for big things.
Then came the main event – the ever predictably unpredictable Ida Maria. The Norweigan songstress had fallen foul of the dreaded lurgy before the show which presented us with a somewhat subdued performance, not helped by the completely stationary crowd. Don’t let that fool you though, her stage presence, even when simply standing and singing is second-to-none and her banter with the crowd always kept the atmosphere lighthearted and fun.
“If you want, you can sing along on the chorus,” she said to her audience. “But be quiet during the verses, that’s for me to steal all the spotlight.” With an attitude as breezy and a face as smiley as Ida’s it’s impossible not to like her. And when she finally saw people in the crowd moving for her anthems Better When You’re Naked and Oh My God, she let loose herself, spinning around and giving us the energy we’d gotten used to over the past year.
The stand out moment though was the first song of the encore when a solitary Ida stood on the centre of the stage, bass in hand, delivering as gravelly a vocal as she could muster with a brilliant bluesy number. Even when she’s ill, she is a joy to watch. More of the same in 2009 please.
Abjekt.