Saw Old Crow Medicine Show in Manchester on Saturday night. I can oft be criticised for hyperbole, and usually quite fairly, I get very carried away with music. However, I doubt I will see many shows that beat Saturday night.
For those not familiar with OCMS, they are an old time string band comprised of members from all over America. They got a break supporting Gillian Welch a few years back and ended up on stage at Cambridge Folk Festival after busking at the event.
But this show was special. They are clever, relating the local audience of Manchester to Virginia where they are based and take a lot of their bluegrass influence together. They released a version of Woodie Guthrie's "Hear them All" on their album Big Iron World, and played it with the more well known "This Land is Your Land" on Saturday, subsituting the original lyrics with words about Britain.
Then ended with a cover of Dirty Old Town and the Smith's Panic. Something I never thought I'd hear.
Genuinely the best live musical performance I have been lucky enough to see.
