Not a Protest Singer

Horizontal on the sofa last Friday night, nursing another bottle of beer, I noticed that Songwriter's Circle was back on BBC4. I remembered it from years ago, when they had the likes of Neil Finn, John Cale and Graham Gouldman on. That was enough to engage a flicker of enthusiasm, which burned a little brighter when I saw Suzanne Vega was on.

Ms Vega was my first gig, at Northampton way back in 1997 when I was visiting relatives down that way. Bands never came to my town, and I'd recently picked up the album Suzanne Vega after seeing Marlene On The Wall on VH-1 (or something) and been impressed. On seeing she was playing a gig close to where I would be at that time, I got my cousin to, reluctantly, at the time, come along. It was a brilliant show, and I often wonder if my thing for red haired women began at that point.

The next day, I went out and bought the rest of her back catalogue. Except the fairly average third album, Days of Open Hand, all were brilliant. I wasn't, and still aren't, into folk music in any big way, perhaps because traditional themes found in English folk bear little relevance to me in any way. Though Vega is often classed as a folkie, her topics tended to stick with the contemporary, and when she didn't (such as The Queen and the Soldier on her debut), it still managed to keep my interest.

For a brief time, she was a pop star. Luka, taken from her second album Solitude Standing, was a huge hit in the US and a dance mix of the acapella Tom's Diner (from the same album) did equally well. However, writing radio friendly pop songs was never her style,

99.9F°, her fourth album and my personal favourite, excellently crossed styles and was produced by Mitchell Froom, who she'd later marry and have a daughter with. Despite the new styles, In Liverpool should still have been a big hit. The album featured help from Pete and Bruce Thomas, formerly the rhythm section in the Attractions, both of whom returned on 1996's Nine Objects of Desire, the last of her studio works I've heard.

In the present, she was brilliant on the TV show - and she still looks fab - giving me the urge to check out her more recent works. By coincidence, I quick check of her website showed she was playing a single date in the UK in a couple of weeks - in Manchester. Naturally, I picked up a couple of tickets on the quick.