Concert Review: Loveletter (Camille O'Sullivan) (Soho Theatre)

Camille O'Sullivan
(Photo: Barry McCall)

Some singers and musicians are studio creatures; the real ones are live performers. By that I don't mean the kind who turn the live arena into an extension of the studio or video - performing the same show every night, carefully choreographed down to every gesture. I mean those who bring spontaneity -  a sense of vulnerability, danger or even threat - to live performance, and who make the audience not just spectators, there to be awed and impressed, but fully engaged participants. 

An Edinburgh Fringe stalwart, Camille O'Sullivan belongs to the latter class. She makes records, and they're very good, but O'Sullivan live is on a whole other level as an experience. "My French mother says 'Can't you just be enigmatic?'," O'Sullivan tells the audience at Soho Theatre. "But when I get on stage this whole other creature, comes out." Mixing eccentric banter, chaotic segues, restless movement  and sensational vocals that can shift from punky rasp or guttural growl to tender whisper in an instant, O'Sullivan puts it all out there as a live artist - messily, thrillingly, gloriously.

Co-created with long time collaborator Feargal Murray, the show currently at Soho, Loveletter, is one that O'Sullivan has been performing for over a year. Ostensibly it's a tribute to two of O'Sullivan's greatest inspirations: Shane MacGowan and Sinéad O'Connor. O'Sullivan knew both of them personally, touring with the Pogues, an experience she described as "pure poetry and anarchy." 

That's a description that fits Loveletter, too. Accompanied by Murray on keys, and surrounded by some intriguing props  - mannequins topped with a cat and a dog’s head, a glowing heart and rabbit-shaped lamps ("lockdown purchases," O'Sullivan deadpans), she interweaves the songs with scattershot memories, confessions and affectionate chiding of "shy London cats" in the audience. 

O'Sullivan being O'Sullivan, Loveletter doesn't just comprise the song-writing of her two most beloved fellow Irish artists. She also includes work by other favourites:  Radiohead's "Street Spirit (Fade Out)" opens the evening; Brel's "Amsterdam" is delivered in a red light to match its a capella intensity, while Nick Cave's "Jubilee Street" is ripped through with fierce aplomb and O'Sullivan clambering into the audience. 

(Photo: Vitor Duarte)

One may feel that O'Connor's work, in particular, gets short shift in the set: surely "Troy" or "Mandinka" would make more sense in the context than than the takes on Bowie and Waits's work that are included, brilliant as they are. But the segue from "My Darling Boy" to "This is to Mother You" - both taken tenderly a cappella, O'Sullivan on her knees - is absolutely beautiful. O'Sullivan movingly turns the latter into a maternal benediction to O'Connor herself ("I will do what your own mother didn't do"), just as she makes "The Broad Majestic Shannon" a triumphant address to MacGowan: “Take my hand and dry your tears, Shane/Take my hand, forget your fears, Shane/There’s no pain, there’s no more sorrow/They’re all gone, gone in the years, Shane."

A reading of the final passages of Joyce's "The Dead" segues into "A Rainy Night in Soho", memories of Kirsty MacColl, and a uniquely beautiful "Fairytale of New York." By the time O'Sullivan has donned the cat mask and is getting the audience to "meow" in chorus, the "shy London cats" were liberated and ready for anything, including  a sweet sing-along to one of her signature pieces, Cave's "The Ship Song."

Loveletter is a night of profound artistry and crazy liberation. Walking back out into the Soho streets - a rainy night, wouldn't you know - the spirits were felt, brought to life with love by a great and singular artist. 

Loveletter is at Soho Theatre until 6 December. Further details here.  

Album Review: Catching the Light (Tim Benton)

A decade ago Tim Benton released Scenes From a Well-Spent Youth: Exploring the Songs of 1965-75 (2015)[review], a record on which the New Zealand-born, London-based singer revisited songs associated with his formative years. Working with the arranger and pianist Simon Wallace, Benton stripped songs such as "Goin' Back", "Laughter in the Rain”, “Out in the Country”, “Chelsea Morning”, “24 Hours From Tulsa”,  “Last Train to Clarkesville” and “It’s Too Late” back to piano and voice arrangements, his rich and compelling voice placing the emphasis firmly on the lyrics of each composition and making each number sound deeply personal.  

On his new album, Catching the Light, Benton turns his attention to some lesser-known song-writing: that of another Antipodean expat to England: Clive James. James' status as a bona fide National Treasure of a TV personality probably ended up obscuring the full range of his output,  and though his song-writing with composer/ singer Pete Atkin undoubtedly retains a cult following, it's not that well known today. Occasional covers have surfaced, but the great achievement of Benton's record - the first-ever full album's worth of reinterpretations - is to shine a fresh light on material that deserves much wider exposure.

‎Atkin and James met as Cambridge Footlights members, and bonded through a mutual love of a wide range of music: they went on to write around 200 songs together. In that context, the ten tracks presented on Catching the Light may seem a modest selection, but they give a solid indication of the range of topics James and Atkin took on; most importantly, the selections work well together here as a cohesive set.

‎While Atkin's vocals and instrumentation often gave the material a folk orientation, Benton, accompanied again by Wallace on piano, uses his stronger voice and Wallace's supple arrangements to take the songs in fresh, jazz-influenced directions. (Wallace has worked with Atkin in recent years.) The approach could seem Spartan but feels full, with plenty of texture and emotional colour. As befits a consummate wordsmith, James' lyrics are rich in imagery and reference, yet distilled; there's no waste, no fat, on them, and Benton's delivery assures that each word rings clear as a bell.

‎The opener, "Thirty Year Man", is told from the rueful perspective of a pianist "in a jazz quartet", confessing his sense of under-appreciation over three decades, and his mingled hostility and attraction towards the young singer who the group are currently accompanying. Benton's vocal bites into the lyrics ("Nobody here... yet!") conveying the narrator's bitterness, though the image of the "glistening" piano suggests an enduring  connection to the instrument.

‎The featured love songs are full of lived, relatable detail, from the aching poignancy of the observed once-shared space in "An Empty Table" to the stark break-up of "Between Us". Marrying specific imagery to a beautiful melody, "The Way You Are With Me" finds the duo at their most rhapsodic, while "Flowers and the Wine" digs into feelings of a former lover, dining with his ex and her new partner. "Perfect Moments" puts a twist on its gentle wistfulness with a killer final line.  

‎Indeed, at their most ambitious, James and Atkin's songs truly surprise, in particular "Canoe", a  stunning piece of writing that captures the drive for exploration as it takes in Polynesian voyagers and the ill-fated Apollo 13  moon mission. One of James-Atkin's most celebrated songs, "Beware of the Beautiful Stranger" presents an encounter between a ladies' man and a gypsy fortune-teller. It's given a marvellously full, dramatic and compelling treatment here. ‎‎Drawing on Keats, "Touch is a Memory" is a lovely closer, celebrating the titular sense over the others.

‎Catching the Light flows smoothly but not blandly. Benton never skirts  over the meaning of lyrics but fully inhabits them, and his voice and Wallace's playing achieve a beautiful synthesis throughout. The pair appear to have uncovered a treasure trove of material in James and Atkin's compositions, and this wonderful record leaves the listener eager for a Volume Two.

For further information on Catching the Light, link here.  

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Review of Park Avenue (Sight and Sound, December 2025)

 

My review of Gaby Dellal's new film Park Avenue is in the latest issue of Sight and Sound. More details about the issue here.