Ben Norcombe @ Whimple Front Row Club, Saturday 19th March 2016

How many other cinemas (pop up or otherwise) lay on some live music eh? So a hearty slap on the back to the Whimple Front Row Club massive for enticing Ben Norcombe along for a little pre Selma warm up slot. I’ve seen a lot of acoustic guitarists in my time but few make more inventive use of their instrument than Ben, everything from singing into the pick up, looping sounds to build up tracks, flicking the body of the guitar to create a rather bongo-tastic sound and slapping the strings with his fingers...in short if there’s a sound to be coaxed out of the thing Ben’s probably found a way to do it. Vocally there’s a bit of a Bon Iver thang going on but more emotionally intense (yep, seriously) with a throaty quaver that hints at a real vulnerability, something backed up by his admission that these days he mostly plays in front of the telly after getting fed up with just being background music in bars (it never fails to amaze me how little respect talented musicians get these days). Well, telly’s loss was our gain this evening, a beautiful set from someone with more to offer than he possibly knows. Well worth a listen.