Monday, August 6, 2012

Gig review: Karl Broadie

Date: 5 August 2012
Venue: The Roxbury Hotel, Glebe NSW (as part of Songwriters Live)


For the uninitiated, Karl Broadie is a Scottish-Australian singer-songwriter with four albums and a few EPs under his belt and a whole lot of other songs that will no doubt find their way onto albums - and some of them were previewed during his half-hour set at the Roxbury Hotel, as one of five artists appearing as part of the Songwriter Live showcase. 


While I wouldn't go so far as to say that Karl is a song machine - as that suggests some kind of automatism about his songwriting process, and he is nothing if not a thoughtful, heartful writer and performer - he does write a lot, and at a consistently high standard. The new songs played during this set showed his development as a writer and also in performance: his voice has never sounded so good. Two older songs, 'Diamonds in the Dark' and 'Sleepyhead', made an appearance but it was the newer songs that appealed to me more, as it's always interesting to see what he comes up with. And the tunes he revealed only made me impatient for him to release a new album so that they can be listened to over and over again. They were all little stories revealing something funny or precious or wise, and beautifully delivered.


Karl is playing gigs around and about - visit his website for details. I classify him as a 'guaranteed good time' performer as I'm yet to see a bad gig from him, so do get along to see him if you can.


www.karlbroadie.com

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