Wintry weather only delayed Rosie H Sullivan's Inverness Tooth & Claw debut
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REVIEW:
Rosie H Sullivan
Tooth & Claw, Inverness
4 stars
Drama was added to Rosie H Sullivan’s Inverness debut gig at the Tooth & Claw when the sudden wintry weather on the way over from Ullapool on Sunday took a starring role for a little while.
But though her gig began a little late, at least Rosie arrived safely – having come back on the ferry from the night before’s ‘home’ gig at An Lanntair in Lewis.
To be precise, Rosie’s former home on Lewis – as one of the things the past few years has brought her is a changing set of beautiful places to call home.
And they all – the island of Lewis, her family home in Banchory and her own current base in Edinburgh – featured in the set of older and new songs she played to a devoted and rapt crowd.
First, there was a special set for support Stevie Macleod – Jocasta Mann joining him for the first time live on some of the songs such as Different Roads, Same Scars As You and The Wind In My Sai,l in a set also including guitar instrumentals from Stevie.
There was something calming and yet intense about the way Rosie presented her songs on the stage, carefully customised with books, lamps and even a little vase of flowers. It was like looking into a painting with Rosie in her red dress its animated heart.
Apologising for the delay in starting, she opened with So I’ve Been Told, one of the songs from her upcoming EP which is out next month. It sets the scene with a female character, longing to escape, but finding it hard to speak her mind and in danger of wishing away her life – all judged and reported by the mysterious persona repeating the words “So I’ve been told …” through the song.
It had a hypnotic effect and introduced Rosie’s voice and guitar which came into their own on new song Fragments.
The song came across as a playful, becoming-slightly-sinister take on the way two people start to inhabit each other’s lives.
At first “my heart belongs to you, my life is split in two”. Then the partner is captured in two ways – preserved “in a Mason jar of sand” and in “this tattoo on my hand”, while the singer's character very personal identity seems to disappear – “I am a fragment of you”.
The first single Rosie released in 2021, So It Is, will also feature on next month’s EP.
“This song has brought me a lot of blessings – and it kind of wrote itself!" she smiled. "Every time it brings something new with it.”
But if that is a song with a history for Rosie, there were also tantalising glimpses of the future with two new songs back to back in the centre of the set.
Wildflowers And Cobblestones focused on the contrast of moving to Edinburgh “from nature to a place where there’s people and traffic and busyness”. Later summed up in the lyrics “I’ve traded wildflowers for … buslanes, tramways and cobblestones...”
Before another new song, the singer was excited to show us the new guitar she'd just got – though she laughed at herself for bringing two guitars for the gig, the new one just to be used for one song.
New song Only A Woman set up a tantalising dilemma – is it about empowerment or vulnerability, or maybe both? It forced you to listen closely. There was no uncertainty about Lights which Rosie declared was a song about love and “inspired by my parents’ relationship”.
“How many times did I say ‘love’ there?” the singer laughed.“But I don’t think I say it once in the song. That’s interesting …”
The love of place that's woven through the songs of the EP inspired its clever title. Out on February 3, 123 Degrees East is the line on the map from Rosie's family’s new home at Banchory to the beach on Lewis next to her childhood home.
“That beach is my favourite place in the world and I’ve got it tattooed on my arm.”
New single Expectations which came out on Friday was officially the last song of the set and Rosie asked us to warm up our voices to sing on it with her which we did, then it was time for the encore – Rosie just stepping off the stage for To Live, standing close to us to “... sing with you”.
“This is the single finishing off the EP and it’s all about living in the moment, and I’d like you all to take a moment with me,” she said.
“Close your eyes and listen to the song,” Rosie sang.
Maybe that's the next best way – after this intimate, special gig – to immerse yourself in this assured songwriter's world.
