Tom McRae / Hotel Cafe

[iainjclark]

On Thursday we drove up to Edinburgh to see the Hotel Cafe tour headlined by Tom McRae. We went to the Hotel Cafe tour in Newcastle in 2006 and we saw him solo in Edinburgh last year so this fused the two experiences. The Hotel Cafe concept is a fantastic idea which manages to highlight artists you may (or may not) like while never staying still

Comments

[veggiesu]

Just back from the Brum variant - and it sounds fairly similar, only without the drunk and without the venue problems. Really excellent gig, about which I shall ramble at more length after I've had some sleep :-)

[iainjclark]

Glad you enjoyed it. :-)

[rogerwashere]

I agree with most except for the Brothers part, though maybe specific to that show you have a point. I bought his CD in Edinburgh. Despite him not being the very best act of that particular night, I quite enjoyed his melodies and after many listens think his CD is the best of all the artists. At the Glasgow show, he was brilliant. I grow tired of too much singer songwriter weepiness and thought he added a nice jolt of melodic rock to both proceedings, in addition to Brian Wright's country rock. The fact that Tom McRae is not a much bigger star still amazes me with every show I see. Laswell is a great find as well. Altogether one of the best nights of music I've seen in quite some time.

[iainjclark]

I suspect that half of my problem with Cary Brothers is that I'm not familiar with his output. Playing live he sort of mumbles and croons his way through the songs in a way that makes it hard to hear the lyrics -- and so hard to connect with them. The versions on his myspace page are more immediately accessible (and vaguely familiar). I still think 'Blue Eyes' is pretty by-the-numbers, though.

[rogerwashere]

Blue Eyes has brought him a lot of success, but I agree - it's my least favorite of his songs. Did like the live version a little better, though. The rest of the new record is completely different and much, much more interesting in my opinion.