Photo Credit: © 2007 Gavin Ireland .

Last night, Gavin and I went over to the Halfmoon in Putney to see Ezio live.

The Halfmoon is a unique music venue. With a history of nearly 50 years of live music, it has a proud history of promoting new talent and bands. This is where Kate Bush made her debut, where Elvis Costello was resident before signing a record deal and where U2 had their first sold-out British gig.

The walls are chock full of signed photos and music memorabilia from many music greats and a flyer I grabbed outlined a number of upcoming gigs in a really eclectic mix of blues, jazz, folk and rock acts.

The theatre/stage itself is best described as “cosy” but it works amazingly well. There’s very little separation between the stage and the audience and that gives everyone a real feeling of connection.

As we walked in, both Ezio Lunedei and Mark “Booga” Fowell were standing by the door, chatting to the punters and sharing a laugh and a joke. This pretty much set the tone for the rest of the gig with Ezio interspersing the gig with a liberal sprinkle of funny quips. In a set lasting a little under 2 hours, Ezio played a broad range of tracks; both much-loved favourites (such as “Steal Away”, “Deeper”, “Thirty and Confused” and “All the Dreams” ) along with fresh new material from the latest album.

Ezio have just released their new album: “Ten Thousand Bars” – which – by my counting – is their 6th studio album to date. This album is another example of Ezio’s superb virtuoso guitar work and tracks such as “Thin Line”, “Holding you now” and the title track: “Ten Thousand Bars” have already being added to my MP3 player (I can’t afford the iPod).

This was the first time I’d seen them live, but I definitely got the impression that Ezio are one of those rare acts who seem equally comfortable laying tracks down in a studio and playing live on stage. On stage, there was no sense of aloofness or separation from the audience; no artsy posters on the walls behind them and no political messages from the lead singer between tracks. There was just great music and a lotta laughs…and the audience loved it.

The gig was standing room only, with around 100-120 people. Casting my eye around the room between tracks, I noticed that unlike other gigs I’ve been to, there was no-one huddled in a corner trying to have a shouted conversation with a partner or texting a friend on their mobile phone; pretty much everyone there was focused on the stage and fully into the music. The band picked up on this and started to get the audience participating more, which in turn got the audience more involved. By the end of the night we were treated to a version of “one day I’m gonna die” sung in the voices of Elvis, Stephen Hawking and Scooby Doo – all of which the audience had to emulate!

When the gig finished around 11:15pm, it was a pretty happy looking crowd that spilled out of the Halfmoon, into the London rain.

All in all – a cracking night! If you get a chance to see Ezio live, don’t miss it. And check out the Half Moon gigs as well!

Stop Press: Ezio have also recently signed a deal with Tapete Records in Hamburg. Ezio described Tapete as “an independent, hip young label, run by musicians and people who love music, which, in this day and age, is a rarity”.

Booga added: “We thought long and hard about them, looked at other offers that were on the table and decided that Tapete was the label to go with. We are looking forward to working with them on our new album and with a bit of luck we’ll make enough money to buy Christina Aguilera some deodorant. And maybe a toothbrush.”

Photos Available: Click here to see a small selection of gig photos

+20