Shelby Lynne & Allison Moorer at Cadogan Hall

Shelby Lynne & Allison Moorer

Teddy Thompson
Cadogan Hall, 30 January 2018

I arrived at the beautiful Cadogan Hall in the super posh Sloane Square and Teddy Thompson was already on stage. I didn't mean to miss any of his set because I had wanted to see him live for years now and was thrilled when I saw he was supporting at this show (due to the fact that he had produced the Shelby Lynne & Allison Moorer album). 

As I walked in there he was alone on stage, glowing due to the lights, and sounding beautiful. Thompson is folk/rock royalty really, being the son of Richard and Linda Thompson (and the brother of Kamila Thompson, who I seen a couple of times live before), and he was a lot more handsome in the flesh than I expected, wearing just a black tee and army trousers.

As I took my seat he was talking about having lived in this area (he did sound quite posh too), so the show was a real homecoming for him and he did come across quite charming and confident. The couple of albums I own by Thompson are quite polished pop-folk affairs but live with just an acoustic guitar he appealed to me much more and his voice was allowed to shine. He dedicated one song of heartbreak to "well it could be eight different people, but mainly the last one" which sounded amusingly cavalier, and spoke warmly about working with Lynne and Moorer.

Overall, he was an enjoyable opening act and seemed to go down really well with the audience. I've now seen three of the Thompson family live, I wonder who will be next!

Old Whispering Bob Harris actually turned up to introduce the main act (apparently he introduced Thompson too) and the band took their places and started playing before Lynne and Moorer emerged looking like the country queens they undoubtedly are. I'm mainly a fan of Moorer and I've seen her live twice before but only with her ex-husband Steve Earle, so I was extremely excited to finally see a headline show and the fact she would be singing with her fantastic and acclaimed sister Shelby Lynne made this something of a dream gig for me.

Moorer as always looked movie star beautiful with her shoulder length blonde hair and simple but elegant black outfit. Her older sister Shelby was surprisingly tinier, not just shorter but very fragile and skinny, with a tousle of blonde curly hair. She was beautiful too of course but I was in awe that such a big voice and such a strong, fierce personality came from this petite little lady, like her little sis, dressed all in black and teetering on very high heels. The pair of them were just amazingly cool and you could feel the bond between them as they walked on holding hands.

They began the night staring into each other's eyes singing the Louvin Brothers' Every Time You Leave. There is definitely something special when siblings sing together and their harmonies were simply to die for. Despite both being in the music business since the 90s, their new album, Not Dark Yet, is the first they've recorded together and tonight they showcase that record beautifully playing every single song from it, mostly in order too.

I've never been a fan of The Killers really but their cover of The List is simply spine-tingling, while Bob Dylan's Not Dark Yet and Townes Van Zandt's bluesy and brilliant Lungs, are darkly moving. Before playing Jessi Colter's I'm Looking For Blue Eyes (which Moorer has actually covered before on her album Mockingbird) Lynne told us that her sister had been "singing this song since she was just this high" (indicating a toddler size Allison) and you can tell when they start to perform it that the song means a lot to both of them.

There's also an absolutely fantastic version of the Jason Isbell song, The Color Of A Cloudy Day (which Moorer makes sure to point out was co-written by his wife Amanda Shires) and an incredibly moving Into My Arms, the incredible Nick Cave song, on which Moorer plays piano. 

Before playing Silver Wings though, a song that finds them on more familiar country ground, Lynne reminisces about their father playing them Merle Haggard records and a little Allison singing along. It comes across as a warm, lovely memory but it's surprising given the knowledge that their father murdered their mother and then shot himself. Obviously singing these songs together has also been a hugely healing thing. They later sing the only original song on the album, Is It Too Much,  which was written about that life-changing moment in their youth and it is incredibly powerful and hugely emotional.

One of the more unique moments of the night came when they performed their Nirvana cover, Lithium. I never thought I'd hear country artists covering Kurt Cobain but I was proved wrong when Sturgill Simpson sang In Bloom on his record A Sailor's Guide To Earth a couple of years back, and now Lynne and Moorer are harmonising on another Nirvana classic. Lynne defiantly delays the start and says she wants to tell us something. "I have no idea what she's going to say!" Moorer laughs before Lynne complains about a critic who slammed their cover and said they should have left it off the record. "I wonder if he's got the ball bag to be here tonight" she says before dedicating the song to him. The truth is it is quite odd to hear them sing it and there's something quite jarring about their wailing harmonies but you have to admire their bravery in covering it.

After finishing the new album we get songs from each of their back catalogues, most of which seem to be about or mention their birthplace Alabama or their nickname for each other "Sissy". This is actually my favourite part of the show and it makes me long for a record where they actually write all the songs together (the new album was recorded so quickly they say they didn't have time to). 

I know the song She Knows Where She Goes (written, says Lynne, about the amazing women in her life) from Moorer's cover and it is beautiful to not only hear it sung by its songwriter but to hear Allison harmonise on it. There are also cheers when they play Where I'm From and, the rather appropriate, Miss You Sissy, tracks from Lynne's big breakthrough album I Am Shelby Lynne.

From Moorer's back catalogue we get one of her earliest hits, Alabama Song, and two more recent tracks, Thunderstorm/Hurricane and the moving piano ballad Easy In The Summertime about Moorer's childhood memories and the death of her parents. It is bleakly beautiful and a real highlight of the show.

They also bring back Teddy Thompson who, after borrowing Lynne's acoustic guitar, admires her tasseled guitar strap (Shelby tells him that it's also useful in the bedroom which leaves the very British Thompson nervously chuckling). He then sings Elvis Costello's Alison, I guess in tribute to Moorer, with the giggling sisters singing back up. 

They end with Shelby's song, the folky and lovely I'll Hold Your Head, another song inspired by childhood memories. There is no encore but it feels enough, hearing those voices sing together as they did years ago as children and now, as Lynne had said earlier, all these years on in London, something they never would have guessed. Apparently there is another album from the pair in the works, this time featuring songs they actually wrote together, and this beautiful show has made me even more eager to hear it.