Black Country, New Road: Live at Bush Hall

Imagine the scenario: you’re in your early 20s and you’re a member of one of the hottest new indie acts around. Your debut album has garnered both commercial and critical success, including a Mercury Prize nomination, and your seven-piece band has graduated from squeezing onto the cramped stage at Brixton’s Windmill to a headline gig at the Roundhouse in Camden. But two days before your sensational second album is released, and just before that triumphant Roundhouse gig, your lead singer – who’s also your songwriter and guitarist – quits the band because of mental health issues. 

The loss of a talent as vibrant as Isaac Wood would almost certainly have scuppered many a band. His distinctive staccato delivery and self-evident song writing chops – Athens, France and Sunglasses are two of the best opening salvos from a band in decades – would seem to be irreplaceable. But, that didn’t stop Black County, New Road. The remaining six members, three male, three female, picked themselves up and set out on a global tour of some of the biggest festivals on the planet. 

Oh, and they also decided that rather than find a replacement to sing Wood’s part, they would scrap all his songs, the music that had brought them their success, and start again. It’s like the opposite end of the scale to nostalgia monkeys such as From The Jam. 

Maybe there’s safety in numbers, because the six remaining members obviously felt that between them, they had it in them to not only continue without their talisman, but to create something equally vital and interesting. Live at Bush Hall is evidence that this confidence was warranted, and then some. 

Recorded over three nights at the intimate west London venue in front of an enthusiastic audience, this is a document not of a band in transition, but of a band completely reinventing themselves. Yes, some of the vocal delivery is similar to Wood’s, particularly the opening Up Song, but the focus has shifted away from the knowing pop-culture references onto a bigger, considerably wider canvas. 

What’s also missing is some of the edgier post-punk stylings of their first two albums – maybe that’s down to the lack of Wood’s guitar as much as his vocals – but that has been replaced by a heighted sense of the band’s Englishness. Think The Kinks and Blur in their more pastoral moments – and we mean that in a good way! 

There’s always been a touch of the Prog to Black Country, New Road, and you can now add a little bit of Canterbury Scene Folk to the mix. Also, this album – and the accompanying film on YouTube – has a rather theatrical vibe, although that may be down to the specifics of the concerts rather than a signpost of future directions. 

Vocal duties are now split three ways, with bassist Tyler Hyde, saxophonist/flutist Lewis Evans, and keyboardist May Kershaw each stepping up to the mic on this nine-track return. And all of them demonstrate that we were actually missing something previously. (Apparently there were talks before Wood’s departure about sharing out the singing on future projects.) 

This album needs to be listened to as a complete work to appreciate it’s staggering beauty, but if you want highlights the opening (and closing) Up Song is a fantastic reminder of how good this band is, and you can hear the connection with their previous work. But the real gem for me is Turbines/Pigs, sung by Kershaw and featuring a keyboard refrain reminiscent of Neil Young in the early 70s – it’s a magical ten minutes. 

Live at Bush Hall is so much more than a great live document of a band flourishing in adversity. It’s a wonderful listen in and of itself, with exciting new songs played with passion. Plus it’s the promise of even greater things to come. Yes, we miss Isaac Woods, but we love this new Black Country, New Road. 

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