Rag’n’Bone Man Triumphs In Inverness: A Long-Awaited Night at Bught Park
Words and pictures by Alan Cruickshank
It was a year late but Inverness eventually managed to see Rag ‘n’ Bone Man but this time under canvas at Bught park.
I was somewhat disappointed that no local acts got a support slot for this show, Iain McLaughlin, Forgetting the Future, Dylan Tierney, to name just a few that would have benefitted from having such a great platform to show their talents, the aforementioned are certainly skilled and capable enough to support such an act as Rag ‘n’ Bone Man, maybe next time.
However the Two non-local support acts did a great job keeping the crowd warm for the main man. First up was Glasgow based Shambolics, confession time….. sadly I was late arriving at the show so only managed to catch their last two songs therefore can’t really say much about their set, but going by the audience reaction at the end they went down well.
The second support act was someone I was really looking forward to seeing; his name is Josh Barry go look him up on YouTube etc. (you’ll thank me later).
Singer/Songwriter Josh hails from London and has a charisma/stage presence rivalled by few, he has a real genuine soulful voice which he put to great use and charmed all in the tent with not only his own music but also a cover of Etta James song (I’d rather go blind) to cover this song you must be very sure of your ability and to my ears he covered it beautifully.
However it was his own music I was most interested in, I have been watching him ever since he won Glastonbury Emerging Talent a few years back his soul/funk inspired song writing is just superb and it was a true pleasure to at last catch him live, I hope the folks at Belladrum were there to see his performance and get him booked up sooner rather than later.
“Finally!” Was pretty much the first word Rag ‘n’ Bone Man uttered on stage, referring of course to the cancelled concert here in Inverness last year. He came on stage with the intent to right a disappointment and he did so in spades. With songs like “Human”, “Skin” and of course “All You Ever Wanted”, Rag ‘n’ Bone Man went about his show with the kind of brilliance you would expect from such a great performer, his assembled backing singers were note and word perfect, his band were also superb, all in all a great night was had by all especially Rag ‘n’ Bone Man fans, worth the wait.
As much as I enjoyed Rag ‘n’ Bone Man, Josh Barry was the stand out for me, hope to see him again soon.
