The back hub tucked away inside The Arches is dark and mysterious and scattered with people who talk all hush-hush and wait patiently for two stunning voices that leap and bound and practically jump right onto the stage tonight.
The first sums up Glasgow’s thriving music scene neatly, and takes it back to basics without all the wiry details of something too new or too wordy or all style and no substance.
Bronagh Monahan, who seems to have appeared out of nowhere calling to be picked up by a local label, may be a tiny bit nervous but she hides it well and cheers everyone up with the charming nature of a Belfast bred girl who speaks above her years.
If she’s quietly confident that shouldn’t come as a surprise either – with vocals to make your Lurpak melt and melodies that soar back and forth across the room, in unison with the turquoise streams of light.
The track ‘I’m His’ with its punchy keyboard and sultry struggles is arguably her strongest.
She admits: “it’s quite nice I can’t see you all” with an audience drenched in almost pitch black, but it’s clear that everyone’s glad they can hear her with piano in perfect sync and musings about men in green clothes.
The same is very much true of 19-year-old Rae Morris.
With recent single ‘Grow’ hitting YouTube and tour dates including London and Dublin, Morris is a little bit more mysterious but also a little Lancashire quirky too, as she breaks into raw track after track that turns words into incomprehensible echoing objects hanging in the air.
Her tracks are very deep and dark and thoughtful at points but in an instant jump up and hit the highest notes with lingering crunch.
It’s nice to see something so simple but effective and so vocally beautiful, between songs she’s likeably awkward, “ur’ cool ur’ good”, asking a dispersed crowd, “is everyone ok? yeah? Cool, this is so exciting,” before tumbling into song again.
There’s something about the track ‘Way Back When’ that you can’t put your finger on, something that expectantly treads all over you and leaves an imprint, something that doesn’t hit so hard by listening to the same song on record.
That seems to be the real stamp that’s setting apart a good performance from a great one in a city buzzing with talent from every crumbling corner pub and a stamp that tonight unassumingly, quietly even, takes firmly away with it.
Words: Martha Shardalow
Photos: Lucy Shardalow
