My Top 10 Album Promotion Gigs of 2024

A look back over the year at the best gigs that were promoting a recent album release for the artists.

Like any gig we’ve attended, it’s how the studio tracks we may be familiar with translate to a live setting that’s critical.

How easy is it to hit all the notes when singing? Any flourishes to the instruments being played, backing vocals, etc.

The albums and gigs here are chosen in order of the date we attended them but stood out from the rest over the course of 2024. Where possible we’ve added the album playlist in addition to the playlist at the gig itself to show the songs selected by the artists for playing live.

John J Presley

First up, was a trip to Hamburg to see John J Presley. If you like the blues with deep husky vocals, then this album, and John’s performance on the night hit the mark.

According to his website “…..John is a guitarist, bassist and pedal steel player now based in Brighton. He writes and produces sweeping, rich and compelling records that balance a dazzling display between the darkness and the beautiful.”

The dark basement venue, was an ideal setting then for the gig and a notable highlight was actually being able to talk to John afterwards.

Album tracks

The three standout tracks on the album are Silhouettes, Sinnerman and Gold with all three sounding great live benefitting from the minor adjustments here and there which offered John and his backing band to add something extra in the mix.

IDLES

Still on the Interrail leg of the #AtoZMusicalTour, we travelled on to Berlin to see the IDLES.

IDLES have made a few waves this year and we were lucky enough to see them in a relatively small stadium venue. While the album had only recently been released, the crowd were well aware of each of the songs being played that evening. Singer Joe Talbot was in imperious form from the word go and the audience were responding to everything asked of them on the night.

Listening to the album there is an urgency to the delivery, even some anger. Ideal songs to then be played out to a willing audience.

The whole show was a dynamic impersonation of the band and all they stand for. The album tracks on show were energised to the max and it certainly felt as if the band didn’t leave anything on stage as they sought to entertain.

The three standout tracks from the album are Gift Horse, Dancer and Grace though I’m sure others on the night would have their own personal favourites.

The gig setlist is below with a selection off the recent album sprinkled across the tracks played.

Black Pumas

A few years ago, I saw The Black Pumas in Audio in Glasgow. For those familiar with the venue, it would be a stretch to say it had a three figure capacity for live gigs.

Fast forward though to 2024 and the Grammy nominated band can easily sell out The Apollo in London. The self titled debut album had class written all over it. The follow up, Chronicles of a Diamond, is also peppered with catchy tunes.

The standout tracks are Angel, Mrs Postman and Tomorrow, though such s the quality throughout the album these choices may change on a regular basis.

Their popularity may have enabled them to have a bigger production with backdrops and light shows to keep the audience happy.

However, what hasn’t changed is the great musicianship shown by the band in delivering the songs from the album. It’s at gigs like this you just want to go home, put your feet up and listen to the album from start to finish and hear the interplay and chemistry that the band undoubtedly has.

Singer Eric Burton and guitarist Adrian Quesada can be well satisfied with their journey from Midland Street to Shaftesbury Avenue. I’m only glad I can say I’ve seen them before and during their takeover of the world!

Nadine Shah

At the start of the #AtoZMusicalTour in January this year, I wouldn’t have had Nadine Shah as the artist I’ve seen most of this year.

The first time was as a support act to Depeche Mode at the OVO Hydro. A set that was good enough to book tickets for her own headlining show at SWG3.

Filthy Underneath is one of my standout albums of the year, and genuinely surprised it hasn’t made more of the numerous Album of the Year lists.

For consistency in this blog post, I’ll keep the standout tracks to three – Topless Mother, French Exit and the superb Greatest Dancer.

The album tracks are full of emotion, reflecting some of the turmoil that Nadine Shah has had during her own life.

At SWG3 though they were all uplifted with a sense of both fragility and anger. As they say in Glasgow, there are times you wouldn’t want to take a broken pay packet home to Nadine!

The third time she performed for us was at Big In The City. Another triumph. Another set filled with unbridled emotion.

The album tracks above were sprinkled throughout the set below that Nadine and her band played on the night.

James

A band that came into our consciousness in the very early 1990s with a stream of hits. A breakup. A re-union and new album recordings. Add to that they are back on the touring cycle.

James are a band that ‘could’ be excused from having to try too hard to keep their loyal fanbase happy. Thankfully, it doesn’t seem to be a consideration for Tim Booth and the wider team.

As The Clash published in it’s review of the album…..

It’s evident that with ‘Yummy’ that the band’s appetite for creating music remains unsated and it sees the band at their most creative and progressive, delivering an impressive and thought-provoking body of work that can easily be ranked as one of their best.

It’s hard to argue with that sentiment and, when they appeared at the OVO Hydro, they encapsulated all the ingredients that have been the hallmark of their outstanding body of work over the years.

The three tracks from the album that shone brightly that night in June from the album were Our World, Mobile God and a personal favourite Way Over Your Head. We all need a friend to help us get out of all the holes we continue to dig for ourselves.

In a hole way over, way over your head
In need of a friend to come ’round and put you to bed
In a hole way over, way over your head
In need of a friend to come ’round and raise up the dead

The Golden Tree

If you are of a certain age, come from Scotland and have a place in your hearts for the likes of Hipsway and The Bluebells then there is every chance you will welcome the project that has brought Grahame Skinner and Robert Hodgens aka Bobby Bluebell together under the banner of The Golden Tree.

The contents that formed Volume 1 took a revisionist look at some of the great songs written and recorded by Scottish artists and put their own indelible stamp on each.

If I ever had the opportunity to share a karaoke session with anyone on the musical circuit at present, then these two would be high on the invitee list and, within the confines of Websters Theatre, the two of them delivered a sensitive set that we will remember for years to come.

Reflections of My Life, I Should Have Known Better and Chelsea Girl are stripped back to the bare bone on the album and sounded magnificent in the former church. If all hymns were of such quality maybe attendances at church would have held up over the years.

The whole album echoes of two fine musicians who have sought and found inspiration for their own considerable back catalogues, and few could argue that their interpretations will be used as a template for others to follow.

Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds

Over the years we’ve seen Nick Cave with and without the Bad Seeds. Irrespective of the configurations on stage, you can almost always guarantee a fascinating gig with dark passages interspersed with catchy singalong tunes.

With a new album to promote, we were treated to the full bhuna of emotions on the night, spiritual even.

Songs from the Wild God album filled the earlier part of the overall set on the night. They remain on a par to those which have been produced over the past few years in what many may view as coming from a man more at peace with himself.

The album title Wild God, Cinnamon Horses and Joy gave Nick and the band the opportunity to draw the audience in to a world that is at times dark and scary, while at other points it happily transcends into optimistic messages of hope and salvation.

Across the night, Nick and the band had us all in the palm of their hands with cheery interludes of inter-crowd banter a pleasant aside.

An artist with an extensive library of music already produced. A venue that lacks the atmosphere of more intimate venues. A new album that many had still to come to terms with. And yet, a night that will linger long in the memories of those who witnessed the passion that Nick Cave and all on stage brought to the gig.

Beak>

A man walks into a tent in Glasgow and sees three guys setting up their kit on stage. With little better to do until the next act takes the stage elsewhere at Big In The City, he decides to stay a little and hear a few tracks.

Forty minutes later, the same guy had bought a couple of tickets for Beak>’s show at St Lukes later in the year. That first impression of classic psychedelic influenced music remains.

At the headline gig, the band had decided to get the ‘boring stuff’ out of the way first. This stuff was the actual run through of the album in it’s entirety.

Opening track Strawberry Line sets the tone for both the album and the live setting. An eerily produced track that builds in intensity until the end, Hungry Are We and Secrets all benefit from a live mix. Despite some technical hitches during the show, the three band members were happy o laugh the off and get on with it.

A man left St. Lukes later that night, content in the knowledge that staying through a stage setup under a tent was one of his better musical decisions made during 2024.

Port Sulphur

We’d been fortunate to see the soft launch of the album Meta Guru a few months earlier in Edinburgh at The Wee Red Bar. In the meantime, we’re also received the album and playing it a couple of times ahead of the Stereo gig, it confirmed that the musicians were all veery talented and confident in their abilities.

Where the Stereo gig differed from both the album version and the soft launch gig earlier, was the pure intensity of the band’s delivery of each track.

Everything about the gig was cranked up to level 11. The instrumentation, the solo parts in particular, raised the bar from being a decent gig with a good set list to play with to one where every song was transformed, energised, taking the audience to places the album had dared to go.

While Fast Boys & Factory Girls and Valentino’s readily stick in the mind with their catchy melodies and rhythms, the standout track for me remains Bill Nelson, he of Be-Bop Deluxe fame.

The Joy Hotel

A few years back we had the privilege of seeing Emme Woods in action. The crowd that day was sparse, and that is being generous with the word sparse.

However, there was something in her voice and guitar playing that marked her out as someone to keep an eye out for.

It’s taken a few years but, with the release of the album Ceremony and the end of year gig at the QMU, all the promise of that earliest meeting has come to fruition.

Emme Woods has a unique voice, reminiscent of Maggie Bell and Janis Joplin, almost hoarse, an ideal vocal for the bluesy material The Joy Hotel produced this year.

Lead single Jeremiah, Back Balloon and Killing Time exemplify the rich vein of song writing that exists within the band. And it is a band made up of multi instrumentalists with what seems like a fairly ambitious agenda with a new album being recorded in early 2025.

The album is superb. Each of the members of the band have a meaningful contribution in bringing the songs to life with the little extra ingredient, whatever that is that turns a recorded song into a piece of art.