Tom McRae

It’s Saturday night – the last show of his biggest European tour to date and most of his record company are in attendance. Tom McRae is understandably beaming from ear to ear. “You so deserve to hear a happy song,” he teases, the audience lapping up every syllable that emits from this literate performer’s mouth. “Sorry, you’re not going to get one tonight.”

That’s Tom McRae for you – earnest, sensitive, seemingly permanently frustrated, and deadly serious, albeit with a warped sense of humour. He belts out the latest single, ‘Karaoke Soul’, with a pained intensity aided by a band that at times battles to keep up with him. Who needs happiness when melancholia is this good?

Having emerged from the New Acoustic Movement into which he was initially lumped, McRae has grown into a formidable presence among today’s singer-songwriter pretenders. His latest album, Just Like Blood, saw a quantum leap in his songwriting with tracks like, ‘Days Like Today’, ‘You Only Disappear’ and ‘Stronger Than Dirt’ sounding even more forceful and poignant in their live incarnation. From his debut, ‘You Cut Her Hair’ and ‘Bloodless’ ooze with barely-contained tension – the ever-present cello adding a neo-classic texture to his increasingly hard-edged backdrop. If a sameness creeps in after a while, no-one seems to care – they truly love this man.

He’s not quite there yet – but on tonight’s showing it won’t be long.