Dom Martin is no longer a new artist to me, but I had only seen him acoustically up until now. High time to travel to Utrecht and climb TivoliVredenburg to the highest hall of the complex, Club Nine.
The hall was well filled but Club Nine is not very big either. As a spectator you are almost on the low stage and you can touch the artist’s strings, if you wanted to. But despite that, a good sound in this hall too.
At exactly half past eight, Martin started his set. With ‘Unhinged’ we immediately knew what we had all come for. Solid blues rock with a tight bass played by Ben Graham.
The beginning of the set consisted mainly of songs from his 2023 album ‘Burried in the hail’, with ‘Belfast Blues’ standing out.
In addition to fantastic guitar work, the lyrics are a summary of his youth. According to Martin, “Belfast Blues” is an autobiographical song about his youth in Belfast, in which he describes his experiences playing in the pubs of Northern Ireland.
He describes himself from that time as a “beast”, especially because of the drink, and admits that he has changed since then and now leads a different life. Read more about this in the interview that Bluesmagazine had with him.
With ‘Hell for you’ we think the proverbial gas is taken off for a while, but the build-up is so fantastic that we end with a blues rock solo that shows that Martin can become a very big man.
Dom Martin is a big fan of Howlin’ Wolf and of course Rory Gallagher. For the first he wrote the beautiful song ‘Howlin’ and later we also got to hear a very special version of “Spoonful”.
For the second we got to hear the not so usual cover ‘Used to be’. It is clear where Dom Martin’s roots lie. The highlight for me was a slow blues, what a feeling was put into the guitar solo of ‘Blues on the bay’, goosebumps moment.
During the entire show the chemistry between Dom, his bassist Ben Graham and his young drummer (first foreign tour) Charlie Hanlon was noticeable. Lots of laughing, looking for each other on stage and Dom calmly sat on stage enjoying Hanlon’s solo.
There was also chemistry between Dom and his audience. Lots of talking with the balcony and of course the guitar solo walking through the audience.
The show contained many extended numbers with many guitar solos. Unfortunately Martin didn’t have time to play ‘Little Wing’ even though it was on his stage setlist. Too bad.
The setlist was ultimately a nice mix of work from his albums “Burried in the hail”, “Spain to Italy” and “A Savage Life”, interspersed with a few carefully chosen covers that he completely made his own.
Dom Martin proved once again that he is one of the most authentic and talented blues musicians of our time. It is not for nothing that he won a British blues award again this year.
A man, a guitar and a voice and a good backing band – sometimes you don’t need more to be moved.
