With a year’s worth of grandiose orchestral gigs behind him, Ireland’s sweetheart and son of Idaho Josh Ritter was enveigled into celebrating Whelan’s 20th birthday with three shows in a stripped down acoustic format. With each gig dedicated to one of three milestone Ritter albums this is Hello Starling’s turn and he is joined for the occasion by a trio of musicians on guitar, upright bass and banjo/mandola.
There’s a terribly devout crowd in the church of Ritter tonight; a pool of delighted faces barely shift their gaze from his curly mop top for two hours straight. The reverential silence is, in fact, rather off-putting – one barman gives out to another for pouring the ice into my pint glass too loudly.
Clearly, everything Ritter does is OK with his fans. When he teases a band mate, it’s cute; when he can’t hit a note, it’s downright adorable. But as I tiptoe back to my post, ready to recommence my cynical response to the audience’s apparent idolatry, everyone’s favourite golden boy is crooning the divine ‘California’ sans mike and gosh darn it, it’s a moment of pure magic. Steeped in rich, spirited Americana ‘You Don’t Make It Easy, Babe’ and ‘Snow Is Gone’ also go down a storm and the Love Cannon String Band are, as Ritter so accurately surmises, a “band of superheroes”. My jig is up, the cynicism undone.
Closing with non-Hello Starling favourites like ‘Me & Jiggs’ and ‘To The Dogs Or Whoever’, even for those who weren’t fans of the album to begin with it’s refreshing to hear a record like this performed in its entirety. Me? I was won over.