We Want Women put together this Christmas Eve special featuring streaming sets from Neet and Charity Stow.
Neeto, also known as Alice Nancy, who is also the vocalist with the Last Reserves plays a lightly amplified and reverby electric guitar on her couch. One of the great things about live gigs is the feedback there and then from the audience. This isn’t the case with streamed gigs. Neeto asks if we can hear her if levels are right, it must be difficult playing into the dead eyed stare of a camera lens.
On the plus side though it allows Neetos delicate but very tuneful voice to be heard clearly and allows her to deliver a short set of songs full of pathos and tinged with melancholy as she looks back over her shoulder, through the medium of song, at things that have been. The levels (for the record) are spot on.
There’s an intelligence that manifests itself through the constant stream of lyrics that lay out Neetos’ world view whilst a Christmas tree glints in the background. The tunes may seem fragile but there’s a real strength in there. Some technical difficulties ensue with Neeto not even sure if the link is still streaming but these are soon overcome and we get to experience the rest of her set of class songs delivered excellently and ending with a keyboard backed version of Joni Mitchells ‘River’ that lets Neeto give free reign to a warmer and more sonorous singing voice.
After a long gap of several hours due to YouTube, Charity Stow emerges onto the video stream. Unlike Neeto’s offering this is a prerecorded video. For the first track she’s singing her first single ‘Here’ to backing tracks and straight away her rich powerful rich voice noticeable. Its stripped down to Charity accompanying herself on an acoustic guitar for a version of her second single ‘Fool’.
A cover of Orla Gartlands ‘Heavy’ is followed by an interesting reinterpretation of Patsy Kleins ‘Walking After Midnight’. The mixture of covers and own material that follows all highlight Charity Stow’s excellent voice.
Words: RBY, PHotos: Bands Media, RBY
We Want Women Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wewantwomen
Neeto Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/heyitsneeto
Charity Stow Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/charitystowmusic