Indie Blues
Indie Blues Gig Reports
Pete Boulter- Editor
The Garibaldi,
La Rochelle, France
07 August 1999
We’ve seen Lance and donna before of course, but that was a couple of years ago in Cognac. Well, they live in France, in a camper, and wander about getting paid for playing – and a lot of French venues will provide meals and drinks as well. This is a smallish bar with an upstairs music room with a wide but low stage, it holds about sixty to eighty people and was full on this night, people had turned out particularly to see this duo. I won’t go through the material because I’ve reviewed the album elsewhere in the mag and also because we didn’t last throughout the three sets – yes – three sets – and Lance would carry on if they didn’t stop him! The act is very visual, Lance talks and sings and plays various guitars and tells stories and the sound is very good – he uses good equipment and takes care to set up properly. There are dramatic bits during ‘ OneBourbon One Scotch One Beer’ whilst Donna plies him with drink – she usually sticks to rainstick and some backing vocals. They shifted a fair number of CDs and the crowd loved it all. It is very un-English – Lance is a dramatic figure, very tall and broad with showtime hat and ZZ Top bard but his playing and singing style is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Even though he is theoretically playing songs I am familiar with, he somehow plays them his way – wildly is how he does it. To me, used to a bass behind me and a drummer if I’m lucky, it sounds very different- I’m aware of trying to find underlying rhythms I’m used to – but the audience here have no doubts at all, they are here in numbers and they are there to contribute as well. Lance and Donna are very approachable and cheery, and they are having a great time since relocating to France after some materialistic nightmares in the USA – you name it and they’ve lost it – and I’m definitely a bit jealous of the minstrel lifestyle, also it is very hot of course….