Upstairs in the green room at Thornton Hough Village Club, a men-only club until 2005, three women rehearse a collaboration that will later blow the audience away. They are Finola, Sophie-Rose, and the headline act Emilia Quinn. They are close friends who have made music their life. Thornton Hough, on the Wirral Peninsula, is now a live music venue catering to fans of folk, country, blues, Americana, indie & more. It is a 100-capacity nonprofit venue run by Neil Johnson, who took the club in a new direction 13 years ago. As well as running the club, he is also the sound engineer and the MC; a man who seems to live and breathe this place. Outside, the sun starts to set as the fans start to filter in. The concert space is housed within the beautiful Grade II-listed building built in 1904. A Hammerbeam roof brings character and intrigue to the setting.
The main act for the evening, Emilia Quinn, took to the stage with her three-piece backing band, consisting of an electric guitarist and backing vocalist; a bass player; and a multi-instrumentalist with an organ and percussion, who all took their positions behind Quinn. Looking like a natural star with her jumbo, white Gretch acoustic, she immediately started to speak about tonight’s gig and was visibly upset that it was the last night of the tour. It seems like it is more than a tour to her and more like a family excursion, or a beautiful trip away with friends, most definitely something that will be remembered forever; as she struggled to talk, and within this, the audience saw how much the occasion meant to her and the others.
The first song of the set was Does She Know, a track that gives us the lyric that lends itself to the name of the tour. She says, “Does she know you pass into my bed with whisky on your breath and a dent in your halo”. I have only known Quinn for a short time, but this song already sounds somewhat like a motif, introducing the audience to the chorus by spelling it out early on, rising to a crescendo before playing it out to a quiet end.
The first thing that becomes apparent is that these are no ordinary musicians that fill the pubs at the weekend. These are players that live and breathe their art form. Quinn’s voice is on point, as is her presence, entrancing, immediately giving the impression she is destined for big things from the moment this evening’s show started. Mike on bass and Eli on the cajon lock in perfectly as a rhythm section, and the guitarist just brings the whole thing together. His talent on the guitar and natural country singing voice bring a professionalism to the whole thing, emphasised in particular on the second song, Worse Than Whisky, where he turns his guitar into a lap-steel through sheer amazing technique, using volume swells and bends to perfectly imitate that unmistakable country sound. Witnessing this was quite something to behold, as Mike and Eli together combined to create so much space while still landing on every beat with perfect timing, with Quinn bringing the song home with a cool vocal flow that dictated just when the music would rise and when it would land.
Dented Halos has been out for a year, and this is the second tour Quinn has done for it. A highlight of the album, and of this set, is High On Life, which is an immediate anthem and crowd favourite with its rolling bass that keeps things ticking over and a great, catchy chorus. Following that is Mama, in which we are treated to a verse in French as Emilia shows us her fluency in two languages, before Antique, in which Quinn references her own merch stand’s bargain bin as a lyric from the song goes, “You’ve become a relic found in a bargain bin“. The song itself included a beautiful organ sound from Eli, whose understated performance throughout the evening still delivered so much as a multi-instrumentalist. As well as music, Quinn makes her own merchandise, and her physical bargain bin includes off-cuts and misprints.
One of the new songs played was Every Life, which includes the lyrics “She’s the poet in my soul”, which reminds one of the Fleetwood Mac song Sara, which is just another of the many tips-of-the-hat moments made to the LA legend during tonight’s performance. Quinn tells us, “I love her with all that I am”, about the muse of the song. In Party for One, Finola is invited back onto the stage, creating a three-way harmony, with the performers looking at each other; knowing glances abound as they share the moment.
There is a noticeable uniformity to the backing band; they are all sporting the same piece of clothing. In acknowledgement of it being the final night of the tour, Emilia has given all members of the backing band short-sleeve denim shirts that have been personally embroidered by her with their own star signs on. A very sentimental gift for a very sentimental night.
An encore is called for and duly delivered with a mash-up of two Fleetwood Mac songs and one of Quinn’s. By this time, Sophie-Rose has also been recalled to the stage, with every performer of the night belting out Rhiannon, Dreams, and Dirty Little Lie. There is a standing ovation from a full room and an amazing atmosphere that feels very much like the end of a tour and a form of closure. It also feels like Quinn is leaving an era, letting Dented Halos become a piece of the past and moving forward.
If Quinn and her band turned up on the biggest of stages, there would not be one batted eyelid; such is the professionalism, smoothness, and confidence. Instead of feeling like a band that wants to make it, it sounds like a band that is already established and comfortable with what they have to offer. A great night and a great headline set.
As the first act for this evening waited patiently on stage in front of a backdrop of autumn leaves, Johnson addressed the crowd, of whom many have obviously bought into him and the venue as much as the acts. It is obvious that the community respects and responds to him, as he brands the night “Americana and Country Roots”, with this being the final night of Emilia Quinn’s 2026 Dented Halos acoustic tour.
The first act is Finola, who is gracing this stage for her second time. She is very endearing from the outset as she expresses her happiness at being here. Her first song is Shotgun, which she assures us is “purely metaphorical”. It begins with a slow and quiet chorus that is backed by single strums of her guitar. It feels ominous until it kicks in with a Johnny Cash-like fast, train-in-motion rhythm. She has a beautiful, natural and effortless wobble on every sustained note. Her second song is Keep A Vow, which shows her vulnerable side early on in the set. It’s about wanting the subject of the song to act on what they commit to with words in a relationship. She states, “Don’t lay me down, if you won’t wake me up“. She displays a great, open-handed, floating picking technique which makes her hand look like it is just hanging over the guitar, almost nonchalantly, when really it is picking out every chord as she sings.
These first two songs are taken from her Waterworks EP, which was released in 2017. Finola explains that due to that EP being released on a private label, she lost access to the music and had to re-release it on SoundCloud. She goes on to say that this stuff that was lost is to be fully re-released next year on all major platforms and to look out for it. The crowd is already emotionally invested and very attentive due to Finola’s brave way of explaining the story behind the songs. She has a good way of not seeming in a rush to get into the song or to cut short what needs to be said regarding the song she is going into. This draws everyone in and makes them feel part of her journey, which in turn has them rooting for her.
After an amazing cover of Drown by Bring Me The Horizon, she gives us her attempt at a sing-a-long pop anthem, Better Off Without You, in which the crowd get to be involved as backing vocals, shouting “better, better” back at her every time she belts out the title in the chorus. Putting Yourself First, which will also be out early next year, is about a relationship in which they “Grew up and grew apart”; again, we are bravely told the backstory. She explains that she has had a long hiatus from music as she was concentrating too much on numbers and notoriety the first time around. She says that she wanted to take a break from it due to a lack of confidence, but “6 months turned into 6 years”. Now she is back just for the love of it.
Her next single, Goodbye, comes out in November. A sad song about the end of a relationship that is being mourned: “you buy me flowers to make up for the things you did, they always die” is a telling lyric, followed by “Do you want this to end?, cause I just miss my friend”. Finola has left her most current stuff until last, and that oncoming single is followed by the last song of the night, her current single How It Has To Be, about a summer fling. It is very upbeat, with lyrics about “kissing in the back of a taxi” and “leaving out the back door”.It has been a great, career-chronological set, which held the audience, and not one of them cared to look away as she sang. She gets a great ovation after taking the crowd on a journey of sentiment and fun.
Next up, we are treated to Sophie Rose, who starts her set very strongly with Healing In The Burn. The Soul in her voice is immensely impactful. It is immediately apparent that she has two possible and amazing settings. One that she begins with: a rich and deep tone that carries effortless emotion, and the extra range that she breaks into as she heads toward the bridge and chorus. We are reminded of Brandi Carlile singing The Mother as she moves from soft, soulful sentiment to powerful projection in a breath. This is a song with a beautiful message of learning one of life’s most important lessons: “There’s always healing in the burn”. Second is To The Core, which is deeply emotional. A lamenting song that feels like love and grief pouring out of her simultaneously. With the risk of repeating it, she has a country sound that carries the essence of Soul music. The feeling that the power in her voice is not coming from effort, but from the sheer outpouring and showing of what’s inside her heart. “I don’t wanna live in fear anymore, so love me right down, I love you right down to the core”.
Towards the middle of the set, we get a cover of Bonnie Raitt’s version of the timeless John Prine song Angel from Montgomery, which always speaks for itself. A beautifully written song that is always fully welcome to a crowd like this.
Chamonix is a new song of Sophie’s that she has been trying out with a view to it being on her new album; a song she wrote whilst at a singing residency in the mountain town of the very same name. It is about a man she met there whom she struck up a very powerful and mutually understanding bond with. She shows us how she can craft clever rhymes that just hit effortlessly: “I met a man in Chamonix, and he felt just like family”. She tells us that she shared meaningful conversations about life and music, where her story and his story both intertwined. She ends the song with the same gravelly richness that we have become accustomed to as she says, “Someone like me in Chamonix”.
Music nights are made from love, passion and people. None more so than tonight. All the performances are linked and are headed up by three very passionate women, and made possible by a man who has devoted his life to the venue. Sometimes people just live and breathe a place, and Neil Johnson is one of them, and this night resonated with both the community and visitors alike.
