Hilary Woods: Night
Smock Alley Boy’s School
September 17th, 9.45pm
Hilary Woods knows big stages. Sure as a member of jj72 she played Slane back when that was a thing that people were fussed about. So, it’s refreshing considering her background in throng pleasing that with her debut solo record under her given name (her first EP under nom de guerre The River Cry was released last year) that she has embraced a more intimate approach, a style that suits the sensuous, sometimes vulnerable songs that make up her newie.
Night, the event, was for all intents and purposes the launch of Night, the record, which in a sense makes the performance it’s self somewhat hard to critique through the lens of the Fringe. In a way the live experience as a whole was really neither fish nor fowl. Though there was undoubtedly a cohesive ambiance achieved and fine use made of the Boy’s School as a space, with a dancer and keyboard player occupying the two raised windows of the church façade that makes up the room’s centrepiece and a series of evocative black and white images put together by Woods herself projected directly onto the exposed brickwork, but the you’d be hard pressed to deem the end product a performance too far removed from a traditional “gig”. It wasn’t exactly nursing a pint of Smithwicks at the back of Whelans but it wasn’t so far removed.
At lulls between songs there was a tangible urge from the audience to applaud but a nervousness about doing the “wrong” thing. Ultimately though, these aren’t really criticisms as much as they are a kind of uncertainty as to where exactly the goalposts were. Woods and her band were stellar on the night, moving from stripped back singer-songwriter fare into more dissonant, effect-laden passages with a relaxed confidence. Even the sparse pedal board knob-twiddling and cymbal bothering that greeted the audience as they took their seats and awaited for proceedings to kick off was of a higher standard that some ambient pretenders I’ve endured.
Night is a fine show, certainly worth seeking out for fans of the likes of Sharron Van Etten or Angel Olsen, and the visuals and minor theatrical nods gave the whole thing a little shade of “occasion”, I suppose. Was it is much more than just a good gig? I’m not so sure. Is being just a good gig really such a bad thing? I certainly don’t think so.
Hilary Woods’ Night runs until Friday 19th September in Smock Alley.
Words: Danny Wilson
