Richard BodinBack in July, I discovered this new artist: BC Camplight. When I say « new », of course I mean new to me, as he has been around for 20 years already, and I had completely missed him. His latest album, A Sober Conversation introduced me to his universe, and his musical universe expanded my ever growing playlist. So when I saw that his new tour was bringing to Dolan’s Kasbah, in Limerick, I immediately jumped on the occasion.
A Gentle Opening Set
Padgraig Cooney & Bedtime Now (performing without the band) opened the evening. Alone with his guitar, he offered a mix of early solo material and a couple of newer tracks. His tongue-in-cheek stage presence and warm renditions of “Emperor of Japan” and his latest single “Songs of My Low Spirits” made for a gentle, engaging introduction to the night, before the room shifted toward the main act.
BC Camplight: Six Musicians, One Small Stage
A little later, the main act made it to the stage. BC Camplight tours with a five piece band, which is somehow a challenge in itself if you know the venue. For those who don’t, Dolan’s Kasbah is a rather small room, and the stage while comfortable enough for the average band of three or four musicians, can feel a little bit cramped when you want to fit six musicians and all their equipment. But Brian Christinzio and his five musicians managed to fit.
They opened straight away with the first song of the evening, “The Tent”, which is also the opener of the latest album. If the album’s opener is already quite intense, the live performance is even more. The crowd is instantly pulled into the mood of the evening. After the song, Christinzio welcomes everyone, and acknowledges the double particularity of the evening. The band is playing the smallest venue of the tour, which turns out to be the last stop. The small crowd immediately cheers loudly. The singer informs us, tongue in cheek, that his booking agent advised him against playing in Limerick. « Nobody would turn up, » he said. But Brian always wanted to stop there, so there they were.
A Setlist Full of Gems
The band follow up with “I’m Desperate” and “I Only Drink When I’m Drunk”. The venue may be small, but is actually packed in this fine evening, and not by random music lovers, they did come for him and are loving it. The younger audience in the first rows is dancing to the greatest pleasure of the singer. In between song, BC Camplight loves interacting with his audience, and soon removed the monitor off his ears. The little device, he says, is less relevant in such a small venue, and actually prevents him to properly hear the audience in front of him and interact with him.
He goes on playing mostly from his last three albums: “Kicking Up A Fuss”, “Fear: Life in A Dozen” Years from The Last Rotation, or performance of “Shortly After Takeoff”. Of course A Sober Conversation is better represented with the excellent Where You’re Taking My Baby, or the witty Two Legged Dog. Christinzio also delighted the audience with older tracks like the 2015 “Just Because I love You” « It was on Grey’s Anatomy » hints Jessica on the guitar before they set up playing “Blood And Peanut Butter” (2005).
A Crowd Fully Invested
The evening is unfolding in the best conditions. The band seems to have fun on the little stage, and the audience definitely enjoys it. At some point though, the singer asks the rowdy crowd on his left to be quieter, but this doesn’t dampen the mood of the evening. A couple rows before me, a young lady seem to be having the time of her life, hugging her partner with excitement at every song to which she knows every word.
Eventually the evening has to come to an end. After joking about being eager that wouldn’t have to deal with his band after the end of this show Brian Christinzio announced the end of the show. « This is the part, where he leave the stage, and you desperately ask us back… But we have nowhere to go here » hinting at the configuration of the Kasbah. The band then started playing the Encore, with the title tracks of the last two albums: “A Sober Conversation”| followed by “The Last Rotation Of Earth”. Like every encore in every decent show, the energy on the encore is to highest, especially tonight as it is the last of the tour.
Final Thoughts
There was something fitting about BC Camplight ending his tour in a space this small. Stripped of distance and spectacle, his songs felt even more human—funny, bruised, hopeful, defiant. By the end, as the last chords of The Last Rotation of Earth rang out, the room felt less like a venue and more like a group of people briefly sharing the same heartbeat. It may not have been the biggest show of the tour, but it was surely one of the most memorable.
