Rock City, Nottingham - It’s a Friday night, in the middle of October, and I’m heading down the A50 towards Nottingham. The autumnal gig season is well under way and tonight it’s the turn of a bit of blues royalty, supported by three guys that have put in a monumental shift this year to get their name firmly on the blues map.
The royalty comes in the form of Samantha Fish, back out, front and centre, on her own after last year’s tour with Jesse Dayton. The Support comes from Gillingham’s finest, and one of the most promising and up and coming bands on the blues circuit at the moment, The Zac Schulze Gang, fresh from Supporting Samantha on a dozen or so of her fifty-date tour across America and receiving rave reviews for doing so.
Tonight’s venue ?… Well, there can only be one place in Nottingham that befits such a line up like this, and so we head for Rock City.
The Zac Schulze Gang - Now, you’re going to have to search long and hard to find any famous sons of daughters of a musical bent that have come out of Gillingham. I don’t wish to cause offence, but the dude from Pop Idol doesn’t really count, and so it’s left to these boys to roll the dice, start the game and put the place on the musical map. They won ‘Emerging Artist of the Year’ at the UK Blues Awards earlier this year and it’s richly deserved because of the amount of effort they’ve been putting in. A Support slot for Eddie 9v back in May, led to a few dates of their own before the invite to tour America and the UK came from Ms. Fish.
Known for their old-school blend of 70s classic blues rock and modern alternative influences, the trio explodes out of their cage with unstoppable, relentless, and adrenaline-fuelled performances. They start tonight with a cheeky drum solo - which no one was expecting as it’s not that conventional - as an overture to a cover of Rory Gallagher’s classic ‘Laundromat’, and already Schulze is making the most of the room he has on stage to perform to the best of his ability. He's decked out in a flat cap and baggy jacket that belies the fact that he’s still in his twenties.
They follow this up with their latest single ‘Woman’ which channels the raw ferocity of guitar legend Rory Gallagher and pub rock favourites Dr Feelgood, combining passionate, raucous guitar solos, catchy driven vocals, pounding drums, and a fiery but funky bass groove that encapsulates the band's youthful energy and savvy attitude. Another cover follows, the Rufus Thomas tune, ‘Walking the Dog’ delivered in a soulful, slower blues style but with a fair few nifty riffs included and then a blazing rendition of Dr Feelgood’s ‘She Does it Right’ for which the pace has been cranked back to where it was before said dog was walked.
‘Running Dry’ sees bassist Greenwell - who’s brazenly sporting a Sunderland FC away shirt in a city that has two football teams to contend with - throw in a delightful bass solo straight after Schulze’s main effort, which impressed Schulze so much, he tells him ‘One more time’ so he does, and Nottingham approves of this greatly. This is the tune where Schulze calls out the first number that springs to mind, many times, and the band have to hit said target all in unison - which gets a little tricky when he calls out ‘nothing’ but they’ve been doing this and awful long time I guess, and no one skips a beat and this is the second time I’ve seen them do it.
‘Ballyshannon Blues’ starts to run down the clock but not before there’s a cry of ‘Red Army’, which is definitely aimed at Greenwell’s Sunderland shirt which causes Schulze to make an appeal for us to buy some Merch so “maybe he can get some new clothes or maybe some breakfast” - it’s a tough life on the road.
Junior Wells ‘Messing with the Kid’ and Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Oh Well’, the fifth and sixth covers of a nine-song set, finish us off- there is promise of an album in the New Year, so this should cut back on many of those covers, but as they’re not bad versions of them by any stretch, we’re not exactly hard done by. Nottingham certainly didn't give a care as by now they were well into the offering and once they’d finished, showed their appreciation with a huge round of applause and many, many cheers. The band will be touring next year as a headline and based on their last two visits to Nottingham, which have been very well received, you can bet your life the city will be happy to host them once more.
I spoke with Greenwell after the gig and asked about his ‘stage attire’ of Sunderland FC shirts - and it’s nothing more than the fact that he’s a die-hard Sunderland fan. He’s also been known to wear the odd international shirt at times, but never another English league club. He also told me that their next gig was in Newcastle upon Tyne - Sunderland’s biggest rivals, if you didn’t know - and for that he’s wearing the ‘home’ shirt. This means red and white stripes in black and white territory. Now that should make for some interesting entertainment, over and above what the boys produce musically.
The Zac Schulze Gang are: -
Zac Schulze (guitar, vocals)
Anthony Greenwell (bass)
Ben Schulze (drums)
The Zac Schulze Gang Setlist
Laundromat
Woman
Walking the Dog
She Does It Right
Hole in My Pocket
Running Dry
Ballyshannon Blues
Messin’ with the Kid
Oh Well
Samantha Fish - As opening acts go The Zac Schulze Gang have done a pretty good job tonight. There was already an air of anticipation around the venue at the very beginning, such is the attraction of a Samantha Fish gig, but that anticipation has been raised to the level of excitement. In ten or so short years, Fish has built herself a loyal and adoring fan base in the UK, not least due to the amount of touring that she's done over here each year. There's a distinct buzz about the place – more than I’ve seen before at a Fish gig - and at a little after eight bells, that excitement reaches fever pitch as the lights finally go down. The band take their places first, which is Nottingham’s cue to cry out Samantha’s name, such is the adoration that they have for her, and when she walks on stage draped from top to toe in black leather, the ecstasy reaches whatever level comes after ‘fever pitch’ !
As is often the case these days, she starts off with a cover of MC5’s ‘Kick Out the Jams’ and starts to strut across the stage from left to right so that everyone knows she’s arrived – as if you couldn’t have noticed. With barely enough time to take a breath, she dives straight in to ‘Wild Heart’ with a heavy dose of slide guitar making its first appearance of the night and ‘You better Be Lonely’ with its smooth, but funky bass line being provided by Ron Johnson. Fish’s vocals are punching through with the power we’ve come to expect from her by now and the whole band is building a rhythm that has transferred down into the crowd as the moving and a-grooving is well under way.
‘Kill or Be Kind’ drops the pace down a level, but only to start with, as its picks up before you know it. There are pockets in the crowd that have their own favourite that they are waiting in anticipation for, and this is one of those songs, as the room erupts at the opening few bars. Fish launches into a really dirty solo after hitting a series of vocal high notes with complete accuracy and the room is in complete unison with one another.
Fish has changed guitar after every song and it hasn’t gone un-noticed that there’s a fifth member of the band tonight, as her guitar tech makes an appearance on stage, ready for the changeover and before most songs have even finished. For some reason, I find this rather irksome – even though it has nothing to do with me and doesn’t affect Samantha’s performance in any way. Anyway…
It hasn’t gone unnoticed by Ms. Fish that Nottingham is very receptive to her performance, so she asks if we’re going to sing along with her on the next song – only to find that no one responds, which causes her to say, “hell that sounds like a no”. So, she asks again and gets a much better response, but not as good as she might have hoped as she then says that if she “has to do all the singing she might not be able to finish the show”. Nottingham had better sing up then and does, and the balcony outperforms the stalls by a good margin.
The title track of the Tour itself, ‘Bulletproof’ is next, and Douglass and Johnson go all out on the back beat causing the crowd to bounce, some even fist pumping the air. Fish is also all out with the slide guitar surrounding distorted chords and other such riffs as the pace increases at a rapid rate of knots to the kind of solo that Fish is known and loved for - all in her own inimitable style. Everyone (band wise) needs to take a breath after this, so they take their leave, and Samantha remains behind to express vocal passion and emotion in ‘Miles to Go’. She says, “If you want to join in, you can clap on the two and the four but if you don’t know what that is….”. Nottingham knows exactly what it means, and it works very well.
The band return for ‘Need You More’ which is “from an album called ‘Belle of the West’ from 2016 or 2017. Forever ago. Ancient” she says. ‘Somebody’s Always Tryin’’ demands and gets another big vocal solo that’s accompanied by another screaming keyboard solo from Finn and they all play around with the dynamics by taking it down and down before building it back up again until it’s full-on power from everyone on stage.
‘I Put a Spell on You’, the Screamin’ Jay Hawkins tune, released on the streaming platforms last week, “which doesn’t sound as sexy as ‘putting out a record’” Fish says rather irritated, is a real blues interpretation with exceptional vocals and Nottingham, by which time was nestled firmly in Fish’s hand, approved of it hugely and we were exactly where she wanted us for the final track (ish) of the evening.
‘Black Wind Howlin’’ had Nottingham fully rolled over and doing whatever Samantha wanted them to do, with its pounding rhythm and blistering solo, the crowd was delirious at the end which continued long after the band had left the stage. They weren’t for moving either as the demand for an encore got louder and louder and couldn’t have been ignored for anything.
With just enough time for the demand to be justified, Fish and the band return with Zac Schulze bringing up the rear for a cover of the R.L. Burnside song ‘Goin’ Down South’ which must have gone on for a good quarter of an hour. The interplay between Fish and Schulze was delightful with them trading solos and egging each other on to go one step further each time. This was mesmerising to watch as one well established artist traded blows with one just starting out and the two of them produced something that had to be seen to be believed. This was absolutely wonderful to watch. Nottingham were truly blessed, and you can bet your life that when Samantha Fish returns next year it’ll sell out again. Of that there is no doubt.
Samantha Fish’s Band are: -
Jamie Douglass - Drums
Ron Johnson - Bass
Mickey Finn - Keyboards
Samantha Fish Setlist
Kick Out the Jams (MC5 cover)
Wild Heart
Better Be Lonely
Kill or Be Kind
Watch It Die
Chills and Fever
Bulletproof
Miles to Go
Need You More
Somebody's Always Trying (Ted Taylor cover)
Poor Black Mattie (R.L. Burnside cover)
I Put a Spell on You (Screamin’ Jay Hawkins cover)
Black Wind Howlin'
Encore:
Goin' Down South (R.L. Burnside cover) (with The Zac Schulze Gang)
Bulletproof UK Tour - October 2024
Fri 4th - Birmingham, Town Hall
Sat 5th - Brighton, Chalk
Sun 6th - London, Koko
Mon 7th - Norwich, Epic Studios
Tues 8th - Cardiff, Tramshed
Weds 9th - Bath, Komedia
Thurs 10th - Leeds, Project House
Fri 11th - Nottingham, Rock City
Sat 12th - Newcastle, Boiler Shop
Sun 13th - Edinburgh, Queen’s Hall
Written in association with Noble PR
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