From Boston (Massachusetts) to an old school Brighton boozer in the shadows of the town's main railway station, Marissa Nadler came to perform on the second of her UK dates. Before taking her tour to the far reaches of Europe and beyond with dates in Turkey, Russia and Scandinavia amongst others, the American songstress took up a brief residence in the upstairs room of The Prince Albert pub in Trafalgar Street.
Marissa, in her little black, backless cocktail dress with a slit up one side to the thigh, looked like a fifties torch singer from some chic film noir. With her hair set in waves pulled around to one side, her delicate disposition and her sophisticated air, it really wouldn't have mattered a jot where the location of Nadler's gig was. Once she started to sing, bathed in a dim blue light, you yourself could have been in a speakeasy wearing your three-piece pinstriped suit and fedora, sipping on your Tom Collins and pulling on your Chesterfield.
To add further to the cosmopolitan flavour of the evening, the support slot was filled by Anglo-French duo Greenness. The locally based Electro-Acoustic couple of Cess Frangi (Struggling to overcome a cold) and Graham Pratt played out a varied, "experimental" set on Korg and guitar. The gentle tenderness of 'Mother' showed no signs of being impaired by any ailment as the French vocalist sang out with an extended range over a sparse but effective soundtrack. Cess joked about her short sightedness and her first attempt at writing a song in English before breaking into the high vocal, stripped-back, acoustic 'Blurry' and penultimately performed last year's single 'Dance With The Light'. The more rhythmic track, apparently accompanied by a video set in Brighton's Queen's Park where the pair are seen cavorting with antlers on their heads ("It's very Brighton", she said), was their best of the night and had a definite Bat For Lashes feel about it.
Continue reading: Marissa Nadler - Prince Albert, Brighton 16.04.2019 Live Review
