Alison Green at The Cavern. International Pop Overthrow 2015. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9.5/10

Almost a year has passed since Canterbury’s Alison Green sat down inside The Cavern as part of the Independent Pop Overthrow and gave what turned out to be a smashing debut performance in Liverpool. A year on and that taste of what resides in the heart of a woman with poetry in her veins and with an inquisitive mind in search of a great lyric to marry off to a prospective, potential chord has become something in which the Canterbury set of old would have been enthusing over and the legend of Whiskey Ginger Johnson would already be known far and wide.

Time can be either cruel or kind; geography can play the same nasty little trick on the music lover. To be in arguably the music capital of England and to have the auspiciousness of the I.P.O. in the back yard is to feel uniquely privileged, yet sometimes, due to lengthy nature of the country, that same music lover is restricted to only seeing someone with the talent of Alison Green as an when a festival possibly dictates or when fates interject.

To come back for a second visit in the space of 12 months to the I.P.O. not only is a show of the respect shown to Ms. Green, but it is also an affirmation of the sheer quality of musicianship that bounces along like Tigger let loose in 100 Acre Wood and yet is simple, refreshing, almost surreal and utterly beguiling and with a voice to match, a voice that really hypnotises and in which cannot but be helped to smile broadly at.

With the new album, Whiskey Ginger Johnson, having not long been released, it was only natural for Alison Green to take tracks from it and present them to a vocally appreciative Cavern crowd. Tracks such as Dreaming Of You, Shame, the boisterous Travelling Man, Leaving Town, arguably one of the finest songs to have been recorded this year in Whiskey and Cigarettes, Kings Lynn Blues and Ghost Boy, all cemented the idea of those present to watch her perform that this is a woman who, if she keeps doing what she does and with such dedication and aplomb, will be one of the true stars to emerge in many years.

A year may have passed since Ms. Green last came to Liverpool, however she remains infectiously charming, her music and gentleness of spirit beguiling and the small nod to the flirtatious, teasingly beguiling lilt in her voice as she serenades an audience one of the true finds in the history of the I.P.O.

Ian D. Hall