Bryde - Delights her fans in Bristol

****

A star in the making 

Bryde **** is a singer songwriter from South Wales embarking on her own tour, well with a very able backing band, having previously been a member of Folk act Paper Aeroplanes. From the moment she takes the stage you can tell she has lots of performing experience, she has a presence that draws the audience in and makes you want to listen right from the opening track.

That outward confidence might betray how performers are really feeling though, you are out there with you brand on these songs and hoping that people will like them. However, with her great crowd interaction we came to know that they were nervous as not many tickets had sold in advance. In fact the venue was probably about two thirds full, which as she acknowledged “is not bad for a Monday night”.  Also the joys of touring also mean that you get to witness fights in Travelodge car parks, then write songs about them.

The style is a mix of quite upbeat numbers, one of which ‘Peace’ was restarted as she wasn’t happy with the way it sounded, going back to the experience and something I admired. A lot of the songs obviously meant something to her as an artist and an individual and they need to come across correctly. In fact some of the best moments were when it was just her on stage where the emotion really came across, no offense to the aforementioned backing band.

Most of the songs came from her album ‘Like an Island’ with ‘Desire, To be Brave’ and the already mentioned ‘Peace’ being the stand out tracks for me.  With it being such a small venue they didn’t leave the stage for the encore of ‘Transparent’ as it would involve walking back through the crowd. This is one of the quirks of playing these venues, though they have their benefits too whereby you are with the bank not set back behind rows of barriers and burly security.

I can honestly say this is one of the best performances I have seen in a small venue, or a bigger one for that matter, for a while. In fact had you just seen the performance on screen you would not guess it was the back room of a pub in Bristol, though if performance like this keep coming she should be gracing bigger stages very soon.  Just make sure you get along next time, and for the sake of the her pre gig nervousness, buy your tickets a bit earlier next time.

Review by Jon Cooper and Photo's by Steve Owen (Icarus Photography)

You can buy the Bryde album 'Like an Island' from the link Below... 

Check Out! the Video for 'To be Brave' Below...