Live Review: Amanda Anne Platt + Hannah Kaminer, Annie’s Burger Shack, Nottingham – 22nd August 2024

Although it is now over five decades (ouch), since my relationship with the city of Nottingham and its music venues first started, tonight’s establishment is a first for me. Annie, a real person, born and raised in Rhode Island, in New England U.S.A, moved to Nottingham in 1994 and started her ‘Burger Shack’ back in 2009, originally at the site of ‘The Old Angel’ pub, before moving on to the ‘Navigation’ pub, both in the city centre. At the beginning of 2014 a bigger venue was sought due to growing popularity, and ‘The Original Annie’s Burger Shack’ opened on Broadway in the city’s beautiful Lace Market. This historic building is the perfect setting for both the authentic American restaurant experience, housed on the ground floor, and the equally authentic Americana music, to be enjoyed in the spacious basement, complete with what appears to be its very own dungeon.

Tonight is the second gig to take place at the venue, with promoter James Windsor and the guys from Cosmic American Music having recently added it to their current venue roster, and with its size. which at a push could probably seat around a hundred people, and tangible ambience, making it a perfect location, especially for this evening’s headline.

Amanda Anne Platt has been a recording artist since 2009, having formed The Honeycutters some two years earlier and would go on to release four albums under that moniker before amending the name to Amanda Anne Platt & The Honeycutters for their eponymously released fifth album. Now back in the U.K. for the first time since the pandemic, tonight is the first of a handful of solo / duo shows (more explanation later) to promote the recently released album “The Ones That Stay”, with a near capacity crowd an indication of Platt’s standing within the UK’s Americana music scene, this being her first visit to the city.

The stage here is relatively low, possibly a matter of inches of the floor, but the first thing to observe was that, rather than step or walk, Platt’s gait could only be described as hobbled, the cast on her right foot betraying a pre-flight injury, possibly from a simple fall or maybe an accident whilst hand gliding, the audience are left to surmise. Whatever the cause it did create a slight dilemma for Platt initially on deciding whether it was more comfortable to perform standing up or sit on the provided stool. The material from the new album quickly took centre stage with the first three tracks ‘Pocket Song’, ‘Clean Slate’, and ‘Window Pane’ supplying ample proof, if proof were needed, to the strength and depth on offer. Despite the absence of her usual bandmates, Platt had little difficulty in capturing the essence of each track, her emotive vocals and guitar playing never failing to transport the audience to the very source of the song. Re-tuning and keeping the guitar in tune on such a humid night was, on the other hand, always going to be more of a challenge for which Platt profusely apologised , conscious of the dungeon conspicuously positioned at the back of the stage.

There has actually been two album released since Platt’s last visit to the UK with “The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea” seeing the light of day in 2022, on which the following three songs of the evening’s set all first appeared. ‘Girls Like You’, inspired in part by Mary Magdalen was proceed by ‘Burn’, and then ‘Dallas’, with its tale of the exploding tour bus. From here on Platt delved further into her back catalogue with crowd favourites ‘Birthday Song’, ‘Jukebox’ and ‘All You Ever’ before returning to a somewhat newer track ‘Miracles’, released last year as a single with ‘Podsongs’

At this point the solo gig became a duo with husband Evan Martin, one time keyboard player and now drummer with The Honeycutters, joining Platt on stage having previously been occupied parenting and entertaining their young daughter who has accompanied the pair on this tour. Suitably convinced that the film “Peter Pan” would suffice on the entertainment front, Martin took his place on stage and proceeded to prove the old adage about drummers. They can generally play everything, and so for the remainder of the set he would deliver some wonderful lead lines and accompaniment on the guitar, which those who solely consider themselves to be ‘guitarist’ would have been more than proud of.

The remainder of the performance was taken up by songs from the new album, though there was time for two perennial favourites in ‘What We’ve Got’ and ‘Eden’, along with a new and as yet unrecorded number dedicated to their daughter. The final three songs of the evening were the last three tracks to be found on “The Ones That Stay”, starting with the sublime ‘Saint Angela’, followed by ‘The Muse Of Time’ with ‘Empty Little Rooms’, bringing things to a close. Unsurprisingly an encore was demanded from the appreciative audience, and with Platt’s slight incapacity it made sense for her to remain on stage during the deserved applause before treating the congregation to a wonderful rendition of ‘The Road’, that would send everyone out to face the inclement weather conditions with the broadest of smiles after a quite exquisite evening’s entertainment.

The night’s proceedings got underway with support from the delightful Hannah Kaminer, who recently released her third album “Heavy On The Vine”, which received a 9/10 from our very own Andrew Raw. Confessing to a certain amount of nerves on this, her first visit to the UK, Kaminer, who like Platt, is currently based out of Asheville, North Carolina, opened up with two songs which originally appeared on her debut album “Acre By Acre”(2015). First was ‘Mama’, followed by ‘Yancey County’, her voice, at times reminiscent of Iris Dement, full of emotional honesty and intensity, immediately capturing the attention of an audience that would most likely not have previously known her music. With guitar in hand, Kaminer’s between song banter was an endearing mix of unintentional self effacing humour and sincere, though very much unnecessary apologies that punctuated a small selection of her back catalogue, displaying a songwriter of the highest order. Two songs from her most recent release, the title track along with ‘Everlasting Arms’, highlight Kaminer’s trait for writing in the first person, songs from the heart, a heart unafraid to bare it’s scars. Her sophomore album, ‘Heavy Magnolia’, was represented by the songs ‘Knoxville’, and ‘Home’s Just A Place’, providing further evidence that Hannah Kaminer is a name we should all be hearing a lot more of.