Last night's lineup was:
Victoria Goulding (and Jimmy on Guitar)
I really enjoyed her cover of Olly Murs' "Dance With Me Tonight". Even better was to come with her fantastic take on "Say a Little Prayer", still familiar but unique. But my favourite part of her set was a tingling slow and soulful version of Sex on Fire.
You can see a clip of Victoria's set here "She Will Be Loved"
Madelaine Kinsella
A return to the Brink Stage for Madelaine, who as well as showcasing her own material takes some familiar songs and turns them round to suit her own style. For instance everyone knows George Michael's "Wake Me Up", but Madelaine put a completely different arrangement on it and beautifully changed it's focus.
She also included her own composition "Ambiguous" which I heard last time she was at The Brink, and it sounded even better this time round.
Nadine McGhee
Another returning artist took to the stage next, Nadine McGhee, and again you can hear her style maturing and improving, which considering how good she was last time I saw her, is amazing.
Nadine is also good at putting a new and unique slant on the covers she performs but I especially like her original material, and her new song "You Don't Need Me Around" was a totally outstanding performance.
But still, her cover of Birdy's "People Help The People" was perfect and a beautiful way to round off her set
You can get a taste of Nadine's original music on this YouTube clip.
Matty H
I knew Matty was going to be on tonight when his fans arrived with specially made up "I heart Matty H" t-shirts on!
As ever Matty performed an excellent set, and it is noticeable how he is continuing to develop his own, really powerful, sound. This boy is in demand and you can see and hear why.
He covered amongst other songs "Closer" and "The Way You Make Me Feel". His fans were going to enjoy his set whatever, but looking around the room everyone else was too, and quite rightly. My only criticism, and it's me being pedantic, is he performed covers, and they were great and maybe what this audience likes to hear, but I know he has some brilliant original material and he should showcase that more.
If you want to hear more of Matty follow Artist Management on Twitter.
Joe Maddox
Time to up the tempo, I've seen Joe a couple of times now and it still comes as a surprise how huge his voice is. And he's still only 16!
Joe gave us a selection of his own material and covers, including "Take Me There", and then he smashed Jake Bugg's "Two Fingers". I'm typing this up on Sunday morning and Jake was on the Marr Show earlier, and well, sorry Jake you were good, but Joe was better.
Last week was the anniversary of Buddy Holly losing his life in a plane crash but his music lives on and the timeless "Oh Boy" rang out around The Brink last night as Joe finished with a classic.
Indigo Violet
Contrary to popular, well Dave's, belief, Indigo Violet are not the first band on YMS, that accolade went to The Haze who appeared back in October last year. For historical purposes though the Haze used a Cajun drum then, so Andy Wells, Indigo Violet's drummer, is the first to wield his drumsticks (that fact will come up in a Brink quiz in the future, so remember it)
The lads performed a song by The Beatles (a famous Liverpool band I think you'll find, Boris) "Come Together", which I last saw performed by the Arctic Monkeys (sorry Boris, they're not yours either) at the 2012 Olympics opening (OK Mr Mayor, you can have that one)
... Sorry, went off on a Londoncentric rant there...
Back at The Brink, Indigo Violet gave us their own song, "i'll Be Gone", and covers including Stone Roses's "Waterfall" and the Jam's "Town Called Malice".
p.s. Dominic Dunn, who waits until I post my blog! now tells me that he ran an event earlier last year and that Bolshy were the first band to appear. Since I didn't go to that one, I'm going to pretend he's got his red parka zipped up and I couldn't hear what he's saying!
Another boss evening of young and emerging talent. You need to keep remembering that all the artists on stage are teenagers, their maturity and confidence is amazing, and it's fantastic to see musicians starting out on their career. I look forward to sitting in my rocking chair in years to come watching TV saying "oh I saw them at The Brink way back when".
As ever there's a lot of hard work put in by Dave Barnicle and Dominic Dunn behind the scenes to bring the evening together, and James (rocking the shorter hair look) does all the techy things. Still need Brink to fix the stage lights though, the music by candlelight look was so last year, literally :-)
The next Young Musicians Showcase will be in March. Follow The Brink on twitter for details.
