Valentine’s Day + Beth Hart = A pretty faultless combination and this was evident with a near full house at Mt Lawley’s Astor Theatre on Thursday night, as the singer songwriter opened her Australian Tour in Perth. Beaufort Street was a bustle with couples clamouring for restaurant tables in the anticipated build-up to the return of one of the finest vocal talents to come out of the US.
But before indulging in the main course, a few words about the wonderful entrée, Diana Anaid, who graced the stage with just her outstanding voice & acoustic guitar, a daunting task for any musician especially on the opening night of Beth’s tour. A few nervous moments during the opening number ‘Fill Me Up’ were soon put to the side, as Diana confidently ran through an eight-song set comprising of tracks from her five studio albums. Fan favourite ‘I Go Off’ was followed by ‘Dumb Opinion’ and between songs Diana was happy to converse with the large crowd while re-tuning her guitar strings after giving it a serious workout. ‘Black Rainbow’, ‘See Through’, ‘Into Your Heart’, ‘Better Girl’ and ‘Perfect Family’ completed the solid set to great applause and I was pleased to see that so many of the audience had made the effort to get there early to support this home grown artist (please continue this trend on this tour… and beyond folks)!
After 20 minutes to get drinks and settle back down, the house lights dropped as Beth Hart appeared stage right, dressed in a figure hugging black pinstripe suit jacket and black lycra pants. She sat herself behind her keyboard to open with the outstanding ‘Baddest Blues’ before introducing her band and launching straight into ‘Sinners Prayer’. Hart looked at incredible ease as she joked and played with the audience throughout the night, getting us all up to sing and clap to ‘Fat Man’ from her latest studio offering, ‘Fire on the Floor’. After her amazing sell-out Royal Albert Hall appearance last year, it felt a real privilege to see her in this more intimate of settings, as she soon jumped off stage to sing ‘Can’t Let You Go’ while walking throughout the whole theatre receiving high fives and hugs as she went.
Throughout this exceptional set Beth tells us tales of her more troubled years with battles against addiction & mental illness and it’s this openness and honesty that makes Beth such an endearing character. ‘I’ll Take Care of You’ will never quite be the same without three-album collaborator Joe Bonamassa but long time guitarist Jon Nicholls totally made this his own tonight with some great guitar work. There was never going to be a low point in tonight’s proceedings, even when technical problems tried to derail her, two minutes into ‘Delicious Surprise’ by way of her ear monitors packing up, Beth stopped the show and after a few minutes of repair work started again from the beginning. A huge mention must also go to the outstanding work from her band with Jon Nichols (guitar), Bob Marinelli (bass) & Bill Ransom (drums) faultlessly backing Beth throughout the evening.
‘Love Gangster’ & ‘Boogeyman’ followed, before the band retired, leaving Beth & her piano to take on my highlight songs of the night in the form of the mesmerising ‘Mama This One’s for You’ & ‘Take It Easy On Me’. Our one encore for the evening was ‘Caught Out in The Rain’ from 2012’s Boom Boom Bang Bang before Beth & her band left to a full standing ovation from a breathless crowd. When I see something a little bit special I always use my wife as a musical yard stick and as I turned to ask what she thought, she merely replied “WOW”. Sometimes the simplest of words can sum up and outstanding performance… WOW indeed.
Set List:
Baddest Blues
Sinners Prayer
Fat Man
Can’t Let You Go
Let’s Get Together
Trouble
Bottle of Jesus
Swing My Thing Back Around
I’ll Take Care of You
Delicious Surprise
Love Gangster
Boogeyman
Mama This One’s for You
Take it Easy On Me
Encore:
Caught Out in The Rain
PHOTO GALLERY
Photos by The Buffman
TOUR DATES
Thursday 14th Feb – Astor Theatre, Perth
Sunday 17th Feb – The Gov, Adelaide
Tuesday 19th Feb – Tivoli, Brisbane
Friday 22nd Feb – Enmore Theatre, Sydney
Saturday 23rd Feb – The Forum, Melbourne
