Sun­day at The Trades Club, Heb­den Bridge, start­ing with a mati­nee per­for­mance by Cher­ry Ghost. The Trades has been buzzing all week­end with one sell-out gig after anoth­er and by now the Heav­en­ly mer­chan­dise table is look­ing fair­ly deplet­ed, but for­tu­nate­ly the beers are still flowing.

The band open with Drink­ing For Two from their lat­est album, Herd Run­ners. It’s the sort of gen­tle bal­lad that sets the tone for an ‘inti­mate’ gig. Look­ing around at my fel­low audi­ence mem­bers, many are silent­ly singing along with word-per­fect pre­ci­sion. The Bolton band quite clear­ly have a ded­i­cat­ed fan base, one cou­ple have trav­elled from Hol­land to see them.

Up comes title track Herd Run­ners, a croon­ing, melan­choly num­ber with the unde­ni­able stamp of Richard Haw­ley (Col­in Elliot, Haw­ley col­lab­o­ra­tor worked on the album). Front man Simon Aldred is a qui­et­ly com­mand­ing pres­ence on stage, shar­ing his dry, north­ern humour with us. Aldred jumps between Cher­ry Ghost’s three albums with num­bers like Thirst For Romance, Frag­ile Reign, 4am, and Four Eyes. It’s a plea­sure to be amongst an audi­ence who remain silent through the songs, as hear­ing the poignant lyrics is such an intrin­sic part of Cher­ry Ghost’s appeal. A few min­utes of lev­i­ty ensue with the dit­ty about a friend’s unsavoury com­pa­ny in Bad Crowd. 

There’s not much chance Aldred could get away with­out Peo­ple Help the Peo­ple and indeed he wraps the set with the anthemic song. They are back for an encore with the coun­try-influ­enced Clear Skies Ever Clos­er. Then it’s time for us to head out into the driz­zly ear­ly evening dusk of Heb­den Bridge.

Check out Jimi Good­win at Heav­en­ly at The Trades

Links: The Trades Club
Heav­en­ly Recordings

THE SMALL PRINT
WHO: Cher­ry Ghost
WHEN: Jan­u­ary 25, 2015
WHERE: The Trades Club, Heb­den Bridge