Hove Folk Club

Clive Gregson: Friday 4th November 2011
Report by Robb Johnson

What a great night this was. Hove Folk Club does rather lean towards the songwriter side of the street, and we had some splendid floorspots from our regular songwriters before Mr Gregson took to the sharp end of the evening, to give us two sets of superb songs and superb performances.

The defining characteristic of Clive is surely his dedication to and love of his craft. His presentation is nicely modest and engaging, managing to balance spontaneity and polish in his song introductions, and his performances are breathtaking in their musicianship. What's also impressive is that Clive always puts his guitar-playing at the service of the song, and is equally happy chugging chords as he is dropping jaws with his single note-lead-runs and finger-picking. It's pretty difficult to single out favourites: whether it's greatest-hit "I Love This Town" or latest album title track "Bitter Sweet", they are all diamonds. Plus at the end he was joined by guitar wizard Andy Roberts, and they closed with a splendid duet version of Carl Perkins' "Matchbox". Magnificent stuff.

We could have done with a few more in the audience, as usual, but it was the Guy Fawkes weekend, so all things considered, it wasn't that bad a turn-out. We'll have to have him back next time when his geetar picking will be the only pyrotechnics in town.

Web site: www.clivegregson.com
MySpace: www.myspace.com/clivegregson

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