An absolutely magical evening with Natalie Merchant, a stripped back performance with just guitarist Erik Della Penna. Played many of the old favourites in a warm, intimate atmosphere with the wonderful acoustics of the church. Her observation about the American political situation ..... the White House being inhabited by a drunk driver and how she was now was feeling nostalgic for the Bush administration brought the house down.
Posted by Colin L on 31/07/2018
An evening with Natalie Merchant, The Church of St John The Evangelist, Oxford - 30th July 2018
I love St George’s as a venue. I sing their regularly myself as part of a choir and always enjoy being on the other side of the stage. Natalie Merchant has the most haunting unique voice and her interaction with the crowd was wonderful. The only downside for me was the awful man sitting behind me who fought his way to the front when the doors opened and shoved people out of the way to get a front row seat. He had more than one person in tears, was swearing loudly and despite several of us asking him to show a bit of respect especially as he was in a church it took the poor stewards to come and ask him to be quiet or he would have to leave. He said he was a friend of Natalie’s but I can’t imagine she would have tolerated such behaviour from someone so unpleasant and had she known this had been going on before she came on stage it may have been prettty unsettling. I feel it would have been appropriate for him to have been escorted from the church and he was still grumbling away behind me after he had been spoken to (he ended up in the second row!) Apart from that and a slight whine from the speaker at stage right, it was a wonderful evening. I feel sad that I had to write anything negative really!!
Posted by Katy J on 28/07/2018
An evening with Natalie Merchant, St Georges Church, Brighton - 27th July 2018
