Florry at The Moth Club

Florry

Starter Car

The Moth Club, 8 May 2026

I went to see the fantastic Florry for the first time at the always fun Moth Club, where they played lots of tunes from their brilliant album Sounds Like... (surely one of the best from last year) as well as lots of new songs too, with at least one making its live debut. It was beautifully loud, ragged and raw, with plenty of Neil Youngian guitar breaks, so naturally I loved it.

I've only been to The Moth Club a few times now but I'm starting to really like it. It is like an old man's working club: I can imagine chaps in flat caps standing around nursing their beers here or a kitchen sink drama having a scene with a dance filmed in its hall, but that's all part of its charm. It's also nice and small, so if you get to the front you really do feel like the whole show is being played just for you. So, of course, that's just what I did again tonight.

Apparently there was a strict curfew tonight, as there was some kind of club on after, so the proceedings started early and ended at a good time (for me). I'm always thrilled to see a show and get home well before midnight, so it made this whole show even more of a delight.

The first band on was a group of youngsters from London called Starter Car, a five piece that refreshingly had three women in the band (on drums, guitar and bass), along with a banjo player and frontman  Oisean Burnett, who pleasingly was wearing a very cool Wednesday t-shirt. At the very least I knew they had good taste and good influences.

The music was jangly and twangy, and had the laid back MJ Lenderman feel. It had a 90s vibe but I get the feeling the influence was more from modern bands that sound 90s rather than say, Teenage Fanclub or the Silver Jews. They were melodic and pleasant with lots of cool guitars and a happy feeling to the music.

There was one song, I think called 2007, that was particularly nice, with a chorus that went "it's that awful feeling" and reminded me of the band Travis back when they first started.

Although singer Burnett didn't say too much, they looked like they were having fun and drummer Maggie McGuire was particularly smiley and talkative, making funny quips and lamenting the success of Reform in the local elections the night before. She brought a lot of personality to the band despite being stuck behind the drums at the back of the stage.

I enjoyed their set and they seemed like a good fit to play with Florry, who Burnett said he was a big fan of. It will be interesting to see what they do next.

Okay, what I'm going to admit next is highly embarrassing, but, although I knew there was a woman in the line-up of Florry, I thought the singer was a man. Of course now I know it's the absolutely brilliant Francie Medosch, but having only listened to their most recent album Sounds Like.. (it's more apparent on their earlier albums, now I've heard them), the gravelly, nasal vocals confused me and I was surprised when the visor-wearing frontwoman arrived on stage with a big grin and started to sing. Of course she sounded fantastic and it completely made sense when she started to sing but, boy, did I feel like a complete fool. A lesson to read something about the bands I'm about to see I guess!

Medosch is amazingly cool though and did remind me a little of Karly Hartzman of Wednesday, who is officially the coolest girl in the world right now. Medosch though has a slightly more tomboyish vibe to her in her Hawaiian style shirt and jeans and such a natural stage presence, it was hugely fun to watch and listen to her. 

The rest of the Philadelphia band was great too of course, with the six piece made up of  John Denver lookalike Joey Sullivan on drums, Collin Dennen on bass, John Murray on guitar, Will Henriksen on fiddle (and occasionally acoustic guitar) and, best of all, Jon Cox on pedal steel. I can't help it, I always get excited when I see a pedal steel.

Once on stage, the band immediately launched into a quartet of songs from Sounds Like...,  the Southern swagger of Pretty Eyes Lorraine (with its harmonica and raw guitars this one was very Neil Young), the dreamy country of Dip Myself In Like An Ice Cream Cone, the roaring bar room energy of Say Your Prayers Rock and raw and the harmonica-fueled, brilliantly shambolic Waiting Around To Provide. 

It was at this point that Medosch said they were going to try a bunch of new tunes tonight and started with one with a very country title, Rain And Beer, which sounded just like you'd expect, full of boozy heartache. They followed this with yet another beer-themed tune, 2 Beers which had Medosch growling "two beers and I talk to you". 

Medosch is such a magnetic frontwoman, she screws up her face as she sings and then breaks into huge grins, often laughing and turning to her bandmates, as she wails on her guitar or blows her harmonica. She is an incredible guitarist, soloing in that raw and natural way, it's a joy to watch. She also dances while playing, but when she briefly puts her guitar down, she really shakes her ass in a wonderfully cheesy way, like a mum at a weeding, and looks like she is having a ball, which of course is absolutely contagious.

At one point she plays her guitar so hard that she breaks a string and there's a lot of discussion about where the spare strings are. Guitarist John Murray saves the day by giving Medosch his guitar, while he takes hers backstage to change the strings. Ever the professionals, the band continues on for the next song without him and at the end, Murray arrives back triumphantly with the restringed guitar and gets the audience cheering his return for his trouble! 

They take things down a notch as they return to their back catalogue for the ballad Take My Heart, from their second record The Holey Bible but, oh my god, things get loud and punky with the rowdy Truck Flipped Over '19. It was so full-on I wished I had put in my earplugs, but man was it fun!

Medosch then put down her guitar and put on her dancing shoes and things went all wacky for the 50s novelty song pastiche, Do The Bump (a cover by legendary band NRBQ, who I must admit I'm not that familiar with) with Francie bopping along with a goofy grin on her face singing "we do the bump!" to a jaunty poppy beat. It was an unexpected cute, light-hearted moment, especially coming after the heaviest of the previous song.

Medosch then said she hoped we didn't mind if they tried some more new tunes and, while the previous two had a beer theme, the next ones were baby songs, with the first having a pretty poppy chorus that went "baby, baby, baby talk" and had a 90s power pop vibe. The second seemed to be a surprise addition to the set as it wasn't on the setlist but appeared to be a suggestion of guitarist Murray. This one, called just Baby Baby, had Medosch with full on snarl and had her soloing away after a melodic chorus of "baby, I love you."

After this she confessed to us that she's actually a huge fan of show tunes and Broadway and the next new song was something pretty different to what the band usually does. The song It Was Always You didn't actually sound like a Broadway tune to my ears but it definitely showed their softer side, with Medosch putting down her guitar and swaying as she sang the ballad with a big smile on her face.

It was nice hearing the new songs (I did prefer the rockier ones though I must admit) but I was getting a little angsty that they might not play my favourites on the new record but thankfully they returned to familiar territory to end the show.

I actually think this may have been the best part of the show, with the rootsy Hey Baby (they sure like those baby songs), which had a real raw Lucinda Williams-feel and this seamlessly morphed into perhaps their best ever song, First It Was A Movie, Then It Was A Book, which ended in a storming jam with the whole band coming together in a crazy, joyful noise, while Medosch growled and soloed away. She ended by dropping to her knees and letting her guitar feedback away and then resuming the song to finish it. It was an absolute joy to witness.

There was no encore, just one final song (which I always appreciate), with the groovy twang of Drunk And High, the foot-tapping tune giving the whole band a chance to harmonise throughout and was a lovely singalong way to end the show, with lots of lovely fiddle and pedal-steel sending us off into the night.

After the show I had a quick look at the merch desk, which Medosch was manning, thinking I might buy their album on vinyl, and she literally only had a handful of copies of the latest album on cassette, as apparently they had sold out of everything else including t-shirts! I don't think I've ever seen such an empty merch desk but I guess it's a good sign that they are doing well and that the word is spreading about Florry, because they definitely deserve to be much better known. I'm just glad I got to catch them on the way up!