Jesca Hoop

Californian singer / songwriter Jesca Hoop is back in Town, she is a long-term resident of Manchester and is here to promote her latest album, Long Wave Home and rather pleasingly it’s great to see her playing to a much larger crowd than when she was last in our manor. Clearly the word is spreading of her fine talent, some eleven albums in now.

Discovered by Tom Waits and his wife while she was their children’s babysitter, Hoop has gone on to forge a strong musical career for herself as a solo artist and also by playing with the likes of Elbow, since she launched her debut album Kismet, some twenty-one years ago.

Tonight, we are more than blessed (as if her mere presence is not enough), as she is accompanied by both Rozi Plain (This Is The Kit) and also Rachel Rimmer (Hot Springs), with the latter also providing support this evening.

It’s a real treat to hear Jesca accompanied by two such great musical talents, and when their voices combine, it’s like a harmonic explosion as it all really comes together, it’s just so beautiful, as magic fills the air on this hot summer’s night. It’s really quite majestic and an absolute joy to be here to witness it.

She looks and sounds just as amazing as ever and is her regular dry and witty self and as cool as a cucumber too in a long black dress, with plenty of great stories to boot about her upbringing in a Mormon church (up to her mid-teens), life in America and how challenging it is to move from one country to another and of the ongoing sacrifices that are always made when you take such a plunge in your life to up root yourself for a life changing event.

Caravan, the track that recently caused a whole lot of fun filled debate and a whole two hours’ worth of material of caravan references and related songs to be played out on the Radio six, Radcliffe and Maconie show, gets a play, its warm and epitomises Hoop’s great talent as she regularly changes guitars, four in total (wow, what an amazing collection she has).
Show highlights included The Lost Sky, Pegasi, Big Storm, D.N.R and Lyrebird but sadly there was no room for probably her best song Born Too, which was a real shame as when those harmonies collide on that particular song with this trio in tow in the same building there really is no better song to listen too, it’s a real desert island disc track if ever there was one.

Hoop is unique and an amazing talent and judging by the massive queue that stretched beyond the Arts Centre bar area post gig, she will have potentially sold out of any merchandise that she brought with her today.

I predict a sold out crowd the next time that she is in the area.