Evan opened with All My Life ("All my life I thought I needed all the things I didn't need at all..'), then Juliana played Butterflies. Evan played Bit Part, then Juliana played Choose Drugs and, without threatening to go Ben Elton on us, you had a feeling they might be telling a story with their song selections.
Juliana then played Candy Wrappers before Evan sang Down About It. As they traded songs they seemed to slightly winging it. A woman called Mara joined Evan to play the musical saw on Hard Drive, and Juliana then played I Picked You Up.
And the bouncing of songs continued, going back and forth in a really effective way. Evan played Confetti, Juliana played Brain Damage, then sang played Into Your Arms, and then they played the Velvet Underground's Pale Blue Eyes, Evan played a wonderful Ride with Me and Juliana sang the Blake Babies' Waiting for Heaven.
Juliana spoke about how Evan was a great under-rated songwriter and that the next song, Hospitalm, was one of her real favourites of his, though she couldn't quite put her finger on why.
They then talked about it being a 'gruelling and pleasurable' five-date tour, before Evan played a really good It's About Time.Then Juliana played Breaking Down which was quite bluesy and Mara came back on to join Evan for a really excellent Big Gay Heart.
Juliana dedicated My Sister to the future spawn of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Evan played a Being Around, with a bit great scraping on his guitar strings after the 'would you scrub me' line, then Juliana played Hey Babe and Evan played Frying Pan. Juliana played Somebody is Waiting for Me, and Evan played It's a Shame About Ray and My Drug Buddy to end the main set.
They opened the encore with a cover of Madder Rose's Baby Gets High, and Evan closed the encore with Mike Nesmith's Different Drum.
It was a fun, if slightly under-rehearsed show that really reminded us of the quality of Evan's songwriting and made us want to investigate Juliana's back catalogue further. The song-trading was a really effective way of adding dynamics and colour without detracting from the stripped-down and intimate arrangements. And they played from a bit after 8pm to 9.40ish so we were able to get home for an early night - a present bands rarely give you!
