Tommy Scott, of Space fame, heads to The Early Doors Club for a brilliant outing with a whole host of great songs in tow. Support comes from up and comer, Bella Whitter.

BELLA WHITTER

The Early Doors Club session at St Georges began with Bella Whitter. Guitarist, Rob Clewar, of the band Millhouse assists alongside Dave Briscoe.

Taking a Summer break from her Drama studies in Chester, Bella Whitter leads with sweet tuneful vocals. Her confidence belies her young age. Two delightfully melodic songs; This Night Is Ours and Sweetest Things; open their set. Superstar has more a 70’s rock riff with some mellow guitar licks from Dave.

It is songwriter Rob, who leads on guitar with some strong, chunky guitar work. Again, the outstanding acoustics from the venue accentuates their performance through songs like After the Rain and No Need To Cry. Ending on a jaunty mood with Once in A Lifetime, the audience are suitably warmed up for our enticing main act. Bella doesn’t have any music released as of this moment, but she is a talent to look out for.

TOMMY SCOTT

Overcoming initial nerves, Tommy Scott, supported ably by bassist Phil Harley, gave us a solidly entertaining acoustic hour of Space songs. Between them, we hear a fantastic collection of their unique, quirky songs from the early days of Space, some of his solo work, recently recorded stuff and tantalisingly, new material due to be released on their forthcoming album., which even Tommy briefly forgets the title of!

If he is slightly overawed by the surroundings, his opening song shows he was more Scared of Spiders. Apologising for a brief expletive he looks skywards where he would have seen the wooden roof, which provides splendid acoustics rather than divine forgiveness.

DARK CLOUDS

It wasn’t long before Scott delves into early Space material with Dark Clouds from debut album Spiders. He then rapidly shoots forward in time to Violent Fury (from the forthcoming album) showing he has not lost any of his initial ground breaking muse.

He endears himself well to the audience in what must seem a strange environment to perform for many artists. The Early Doors audiences are always keen to appreciate quality when they hear it and it was in abundance through songs like Begin Again. With the warm response he was getting he must have felt he Was The (Un)Luckiest Man In The Whole Damn World. Well he wasn’t struck down by lightning after a few more verbal slips. There was much empathy in songs revealing that people are crazy in love when love can drive you crazy. His clever guitar work resonates warmly around the church as did the mellow bass guitar work from Phil.

Tommy recalls a TFI moment in the bar when singing Cry Like A Wimp in the bar but despite passing on a songwriting partnership they have, since the 1990’s, retained much notoriety.

There is emotion and passion not only in his singing throughout the evening. Singing Avenging Angels, Scott pays tribute to a friend Jordan, who recently passed away. Many would also resonate with the heartfelt Nothing Left In The Treasure Chest, expressing how one can become emotionally bereft by demanding friends and family.

The uniqueness of the subject matter of his songs often inspired by his love of film and TV, which often tell short stories like in Day of the Dead when someone travels to Mexico for a romantic tryst only to discover the loved one is a vampire!

A CLASSY PERFORMANCE

Not only was this a classy performance by Tommy and Phil but he also showed his personal quality when he applauded the performance of Bella Whitter; encouraging this young performer. Now that is class and rarely seen as genuine as he was.

The enigmatic songs continued to flow with more inventive and originality from Mr Psycho and Light It Up, another promising song from the new album which carried a warning of never to take the devil’s last cigarette. Again he leaps in time, concluding the evening with a visit to the early days with Me and You Against The World and Neighbourhood.

The shortest of interludes after rousing applause and warm appreciation made the evening end perfectly with, of course, The Female Of The Species.

The Early Doors events are conducive to a bit of artist/audience socialising and Tommy and Phil spent ages chatting, taking selfies and signing, once again showing their close connection they enjoy with their fans. It really looked like they were enjoying it too without any shock, shock, horror, horror moments!

Tommy Scott: Website / Instagram / Facebook

Bella Whitter: TikTok / Instagram

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