There it is. The sign that proves there is such a thing as a divine entity. No, not free beer for that would merely prove that temptation exists outside the Garden of Eden but how about personally viewing a visitor from Englandshire exclaim disbelief regarding getting change from a tenner for a round? I digress, however, for I was at Sweeney’s on the Park for more than the beer. Like the music. Honest.
Firing up tonight’s musical motor, the redoubtable Crawford Smith - the chilli chocolate of many an acoustic night out on the south side of dear old Glasgow – introduces Chiara Berardelli, for it is she, with her urbane precision and fondness for the old fashioned concept of melody taking the appreciative audience for a trek through the fields of emotion. She wears her heart on her sleeve, without a doubt.
Leading us then down the path to wholesomeness were Daisywheels. If they were a house, the would be best described as compact, bijou and nicely appointed with the kind of four on the floor enthusiastic harmonies that would suggest a love for the ways of both folk and Americana providing the wallpaper on the walls. In the land of nicey niceness, Daisywheels would be the nicest. That, just like the sunrise, is a fact.
But a blink of the eye later and the sunshine and shadows that are Something Someone took to the stage. Again, subtlety and mellifluous harmonies underpinned their game plan and, as they took the bouncing ball of opportunity and played it straight into the back of the net, you might well be driven by their efforts to dream of such things as lost love and bunny rabbits. Beware though, for beneath the saccharine sweetness, there lies rather more acute observations on matters of the heart than you might expect.
Click your heels three times and you will be back in Bathgate. Bathgate? God has a strange sense of humour.