It feels good to be at a gig again. To head straight over from work, grab a beer and say hello to familiar faces, while the longhairs on stage make juicy noises with loud guitars. People hug and bump fists, looking delighted to be here. The merch guy is greeted like a hero. At least two punters are wearing Slash-style top hats. We’ve missed this. It’s the sort of genial atmosphere that Jack J Hutchinson sustains with ease.
Support comes from Brit rockers The Bad Day and sleazy Swiss-turned-London troupe Daxx & Roxane, but it’s Jack’s night as he launches new album The Hammer Falls. After a weaker vocal start with Straight To Hell (Hutchinson not quite tearing into the mic as… well, hellishly as you’d hope), the game-raising likes of Down By The River and Gunslinger fill the room with melodic heft – all Black Label Society-via-Sabbath rumbles and moody southern haze. It’s all boosted by bassist Lazarus Michaelides and drummer Felipe Amorim, a driven, engaging rhythm section, with Amorim twirling his sticks and throwing back his head like he’s headlining Wembley. I Will Follow You (written following Hutchinson’s father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis) reveals softened depth, but really it’s bigger thinking – bigger top notes, chops and songs – that elevate him from ‘decent blues bloke’ to real rock contender.