(Photo by
Pinkfish)Paolo Nutini - 2006 September 13Hotel Cafe, Los Angeles, CA01: Alloway Grove02: Rewind03: Day Dream04: New Shoes05: These Streets06: January07: Million Faces08: Last Request09: Loving You10: Jenny Don't Be HastyRecording quality: A- (digital audience recording)Gig rating: 6.6/10
See below to downloadAs unlikely as it is that one named José González would hail from Sweden, so too is it that
Paolo Nutini would be of Scottish derivation. Equally unlikely is that a performer whose album hit #3 on the UK charts would be playing a so cozy an LA venue as the
Hotel Cafe, just days before his inaugural visit to the
Austin City Limits Festival. The cat calls of the women in attendance, however, suggested that Nutini is not unknown to at least some of the 51% of the US population.Given Nutini's looks and stage presence it's clear that despite being in the world for just 19 years he's far from being unfamiliar with the fairer sex. Nutini - whose mother is Glaswegian and whose father's Italian family has resided in Scotland for four generations - crafts feel-good pop that evokes
Jack Johnson and the better work of
Xavier Rudd. Veering not too far from these brethren, his work vocally is reminiscent of
Men at Work's
Colin Hay and fill-in-the-blank
Marley, along with smatterings of
Coldplay and other British heartthrobs of a similar ilk. Just the same,
it's claimed that his influences include David Bowie, Damien Rice, Oasis, the Beatles, U2, Pink Floyd and Fleetwood Mac.
Pinkfish's
post about Nutini introduced me to his work, and as neither of us had been to Hotel Cafe, we pocketed the extra stone and headed out for a two-bird gig. Ending up about 10 feet of stage-left, we were treated to what's almost certain to be this lad's last show in so intimate a venue as this.Opening with the raucous "Alloway Grove," Nutini easily slipped into the balled "Rewind," one of the three strongest songs of the evening. Constantly back and forth between tempos, he followed his nonchalant cover of
The Lovin' Spoonful's "Day Dream" with the upbeat "New Shoes," then to "These Streets," a tune with something of a "Redemption Song" groove about it. The second half of the set began with "January," the best rendered song of the evening - and one that might well fit into Jack Johnson's ear as easily as
G. Love's. After a few more songs (including "Last Request," which landed at #5 on the UK pop charts), Nutini ended with his forthcoming single, "Jenny Don't Be Hasty," a song that tells the singer-songwriter's experience of lying to a 23-year-old girl about his age, and the third of the three-best songs of the evening.According to the setlist, he planned to encore with "Autumn," but didn't have the time to perform it, equally to the chagrin of Nutini as well as the audience. My guess is that he'll be closing the night as the headliner next time he visits LA, and can play whatever he damn-well pleases. In the meantime, if you're interested in more of Pinkfish's photos, go
here.
Download the gig:-
mp3 format at multiply.com (personal listening only)- (taken down by the
RIAA)
CD-quality flac format at Dimeadozen (for
trading / seeding)
Buy Paolo Nutini recordings:
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