Music > Live Reviews

Baxter Dury

Norwich Arts Centre

24/04/18

After a weekend in which we were finally able to bask in good weather, arriving for this sold out show felt more like a continuation of those good times, rather than a potentially quiet Monday night gig. Despite garnering relatively modest commercial success Baxter, crucially, has the critics onside and rarely will you ever see a bad word written about him and after watching this show it’s easy to see why.

Before Baxter though we had rising Suffolk artist Bessie Turner for whom 2017 had been a defining year in her young career. Backed by a three-piece band, including two members of SuperGlu, she provided a pleasant but at times rather unremarkable set. She possesses a genuinely good voice, with the right balance between conviction and kooky, but currently too much of her material is forgettable. The slower, more Lynchian numbers worked best, the songs with a more indie rock flavour less so. Most importantly though Bessie was an instantly likeable personality and it is this that will help to take her further, especially as she further develops her own sound.

Baxter Dury has been in the public eye since he was 5 years old. The cool kid on the sleeve of Dad Ian’s classic New Boots & Panties album? Yep, that’s Baxter. A relief then that he has grown up and not only retained that cool but has also carved himself a musical niche that is at once unique and strangely timeless. Backed, brilliantly, by a 5-piece band consisting of guitar, bass, drums and two backing singers also playing keys and synths, the sound was big, punchy and crisp. The crowd were refreshingly raucous too, there’s just something about Baxter that makes you want to shout. His on-stage persona was instantly likeable, cliché to say it but the kind of guy you just know would make for a first class drinking buddy. Suited, glass of wine in hand and obviously very happy to be here he grooved his funky groove, laughed along to the many comments being shouted at him throughout and provided the focal point without ever seeming like he had to do too much. He spoke sang in his Cockney style, he sat at his own keyboard/synth set up, at times looking genuinely chuffed when he created some crazy sound or other, indeed during the dub echo of Porcelain he came over all dread at the controls.

His music takes elements of dub, punk, new wave, dance and spoken word and fuses them into something incredibly captivating – at once dirty, sexy and downright funny. To pick out highlights would suggest not every song worked, but this was not the case, as it’s his two most recent albums that I’m most familiar with though it was tracks from those which pleased me the most – Palm Trees, Pleasure, Miami & Prince Of Tears, but the version of Cocaine Man in which Baxter forgot the words was also memorable.

At a little over and hour this was quite a short set, but it was a great one during which the magic happened; frontman, band and audience in perfect harmony. I was left wanting more for sure – nice one Baxter Dury you facking diamond geezer.