In an ideal world Brett Sparks of the Handsome Family would have a roadie – or a technician even – who would dutifully produce a capo for his guitar at the required moment.
Such luxuries as yet being denied him, and his wife and singing-songwriting partner Rennie having downed tools to go and rummage backstage unsuccessfully, this meant we missed out on at least one song from the Handsomes' new album, Wilderness, the whole purpose, as Brett remarked with weary fatalism, of the tour that brought them back to Glasgow.
Such hiccups are all part of the Handsomes' charm, like the schoolmarmly way Rennie handed over her titchy bass guitar – a veritable toy in the well-built Brett's hands – and reminded her husband that the doctor said he has to play it for ten minutes every day.
There may actually be some substance behind the mocking hint of musical therapy as Brett's bi-polarity is no secret and the pills he needs crop up in songs such as the new country ballad that captures the musical essence of the late George Jones while detailing the – alas – fictitious list of motley possessions covered by the couple's home insurance.
The optimism of flies, the magnificence of glow worms and the intriguing story of compulsive window smasher Mary Sweeney informed songs and Rennie's mirth-inducing oratories in a set that overcame its air of endearing shambles, as the Handsomes tend to do, with some genuinely fine singing – especially on the older Weightless Again – plangent guitar picking and, except for one loudly misplaced stroke that crumpled the Sparks normally laughter-defying faces, a model lesson in unobtrusiveness from their possibly long-suffering drummer.
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