Americana lives on imagery. On the ability to turn moments, memories and scars into something vivid and unsettling. Ben de la Cour understands that instinctively.
He jokes that people tell him he needs to stop introducing his songs. Then immediately does exactly that, explaining that “Swan Dive” was inspired by seeing someone jump from a window when he was a kid — which, really, tells you everything you need to know.
He opens with the brilliant “God’s Only Son,” setting the tone straight away. Stark, uneasy, and rooted in real life, his songs are built on poetic verses with a faintly biblical undertow. They allow him to tell dark, elliptical stories without ever overplaying them.
“The Devil Went Down to Silver Lake” reinforces his fascination with end-of-times imagery and moral unease. “Numbers Game” follows, its tension building before the set ends abruptly with the stark “Christina,” taken from his new album.
At one point he admits he doesn’t play venues like this very often. You sense that immediately. These songs feel best suited to smaller, more intimate rooms, where their detail and tension can really breathe. Still, for his short time on the stage at Birmingham Town Hall, he leaves a strong impression — compelling, thoughtful, and quietly disarming.
Not for nothing does Lucinda Williams finish her set with “Rockin’ in the Free World” by Neil Young. In the free world, indeed.
These are strange times, and with Trump never far from the conversation, politics becomes the centre point of her set this evening. Time and again she returns to her more politically charged songs, drawing the audience in. When she comes right to the front for “Rockin’ in the Free World,” the moment lands with particular force.
Time and illness have clearly taken their toll, but what is equally clear is that the fire still burns deep within her. The voice is still the same. She remains something of a force of nature.
She opens with “Worlds Gone Wrong,” setting the tone immediately, and the wonderful slide guitar of Marc Ford is to the fore — and certainly not for the last time this evening. “Stolen Moments” is dedicated to Tom Petty, and it’s clear she is still coming to terms with the loss of a friend.
“I Lost It” is introduced with a joke. She admits she’s still not entirely sure what she lost, and says if anyone ever works it out, she’d like to know. By the end of the song she lands on the truth herself: she lost her youthful vigour. “But I did the best I could.” That rather sums it up. This is a woman who has lived a life, and is still here to tell the tale — through her own songs and the ones she chooses to cover.
There’s a nod to “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road,” arguably her breakthrough, and she talks about the music business — about artists being treated as products, commodities to be marketed like anything else. She apologises briefly for rattling on, then launches into “Yellow El Camino,” where Marc Ford’s guitar once again takes the spotlight.
She introduces newer material too. “Low Life,” inspired by a good bar — because she likes a good bar and a good jukebox — and “Fruits of My Labor,” where the harmonica adds real bite to a song dealing with jealousy and old wounds. A cover of Bob Marley’s “How Much Trouble in the World” fits seamlessly.
Before “Freedom Speaks,” she talks about freedom of speech being eroded, about the US Constitution being ripped up in front of us on a daily basis. In that context, her version of “You Can’t Rule Me,” dedicated to Trump, is particularly powerful. She carries on in that vein with “How Much Did You Get for Your Soul,” apologising — briefly — for all the political material, before dismissing the idea entirely. She has plenty to say, and she knows it.
“Black Train Blues” reaches back to the American civil rights movement, before she returns to her debut album for “Change the Locks.” More recent material sits comfortably alongside the older songs, and once again Marc Ford is superb on “Righteously,” funky, expressive, and completely locked in.
“Honey Bee” is a real rabble-rouser to finish, before “Hard Time Killing Floor Blues,” written during the Depression, brings things back to older traditions and harder times. The joy in “Joy” is there, but so is the anger — the same anger that’s always been part of her music.
Eventually, she brings us back to where we started, with Neil Young. Throughout the set she talks about artists who did a bit of everything, who refused to be categorised — rock, blues, soul, funk, folk. That’s where she sees herself, and she lives up to it tonight.
What she leaves us with is the thought of Patti Smith — people have the power. And if there is still power in rock and roll, Lucinda Williams proves it’s alive and burning here.
MAIN PICTURE: MIKE REEVES
