Redgrave Theatre
Ye Vagabonds are as Irish and Traditional as it gets. Not silly over the top Irish Music like Mary Wallopers or Skinny Lister; not reinvented Irish music like Lankum. They just sing and play. These are two brothers whose parents used to sing I'm A Rover Seldom Sober on long car journeys; who can fiddle and mandolin so purely that one member of the audience is moved to shout out something in Gaelic; who learned their songs from particular singers and source them to particular parts of Ireland; who sing versions of familiar songs that we are not quite familiar with. Here is a broken token ballad that follows the plot of Plains of Waterloo but has a quite different melody; here is a song with a flavour of Clyde Water and a melody that songs like Long Lankum but is definitely not either; here is one of those lost-love songs which says "The first time I saw my love she was....:" at the beginning of each verse. I take personal credit for them winning the Best Traditional Act at the last Folk Awards, because I was rooting for my favourite Bristol duo Sid and Jimmy, and therefore jinxed it. They don't come to England very often, but if you like not-too-po-faced authenticity you should travel a moderately long way to hear them.
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