Last night (Friday May 24th) at Chat’s Palace in Hackney, East London Big Steve and Stephanie Arlene played to a small but very appreciative audience.
They were actually the support to bluegrass band Foghorn Leghorn and with all due respect to Foghorn, I couldn’t help but think this bill was upside down. No matter it suited their needs as they now live in Norwich and had driven down with their two daughters and had to drive back the same night.
For the most part they played as a duo, with added double bass and mandolin on their final song, a marvellous version of Springboard.
They’re a bit rusty. Opening song Love Her Like A Demon had to be restarted when Steve forgot the words. He forgot them on the restart, but busked on to a point where he knew to come in. Another unrehearsed song got aborted when they couldn’t remember the words, but it didn’t matter because it was a really relaxed friendly, almost conversational atmosphere and everyone was simply pleased to see them back.
There was the title track from Going to California and Lonely Won’t Leave Me Alone plus a few from as yet unreleased album About A Million, Billion, Trillion which sound fine.
It was a real pleasure to see them back. I hope to be seeing a lot more of them over the next few years.
For anyone living in or near London The Arlenes are playing at Come Down And Meet The Folks at The Apple Tree pub Mount Pleasant WCI tomorrow, Sunday 27th May.
