lundi 28 Sep 2009, 16h18m
The evening after the evening before and back up to Brussels, or in this case the outskirts, under the church spire of St Elizabeth on a leafy square in Haren for the first gig of the new season at the blik. It was good to be back here after the summer recess. For the uninitiated here the Toogenblik occupies a few first floor rooms in a old red brick building that was at one time the parsonage. The actual room used for the gigs used to be the priest's bedroom. Now it's occupied by music appreciating beer drinkers and nice folks who give up their time to run the place, a selection of sinners and saints. There are cracks in the high ceilings and it's walls are festooned with old posters, black and white photographs, signed pictures and much music and beer related memorabilia and artefacts. It's old and a little shabby but there is an unbelievable warmth to the place and it's probably this country's best club venue. Anyway, that's enough info..
It was a bit difficult this one as it was on the back of such a superb gig the night before that I sort of feared it would be difficult to get into Eilen's music. Had The Low Anthem temporarily dulled my pallet for anything else?
I got to the venue a half hour before kick off to see a breakdown truck and folks working on the tour bus…oh dear! Turns out it had broken down and there was a bit of a behind the scenes panic going on to get something organised as the band had to leave for Paris after the gig. At about 10 past 9 Luc Geldof (no relation) stepped between the tables and onto the tiny stage to do what are becoming his legendary introductions as he introduces the artists and do a few parish notices. Trying to do this in three languages sometimes results in a linguistic gaffe or a funny remark with the artist looking a bit perplexed behind him and the audience guffawing with laughter and tonight was no exception. Then Eilen stepped up to mic, slung her guitar over her shoulder and played this..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFcF7vWpOMo
Not being too familiar with her stuff the first thing I noticed was that this was a class act, she's got a great bluesy voice and the guys in the band were just excellent players especially Stetson wearing Gerry Miller on guitar, he played some excellent licks. In all honesty it did take me a while to really get into it fully as not only was the last gig still buzzing but I was stuck at the back as the place was full. There then followed a selection of songs from her three albums with Sea of Tears (love that title track) in the prominent role prompting my neighbour to borrow my CDs at regular intervals to check the track names and also prompting brisk business on the table out in the hall. We also had couple of cracking traditional numbers from The Sacred Shakers, her country gospel band plus we had a couple of covers, "I'm Gonna Dress in Black" (THEM)and "Ain't Nobody's business" (Billy Holiday) and the Toogenblik was really brought to the boil with the old Johnny Kidd and the Pirates hit Shakin' all Over with folks whoopin' and whistling in appreciation….this was great stuff, I was totally won over!
This was an absolutely superb gig with folks giving the group a standing ovation at the end and it certainly managed to loosen some dust that had settled over the summer on the fixtures and fittings at this superb little venue. There's more nicely filmed video footage from this gig (almost the whole two sets) available on youtube.