Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

There is a calming effect on the audience to which takes a sense of the pure soul in which to capture when they are on stage. Many have this quality, but it is in tandem with the exuberance of the immense, the industrial like performance which whips up a frenzy in the aisles and leaves the heart thumping, sometimes out of time with the message in the set.

To Garry Christian and the resounding passionate players that arrived on stage at Edinburgh’s Usher Hall, this calmness, the assured presence of a group in touch with their own place in the world would have been a blessing, a drive nonetheless born of greatness, but also one in which the simplicity of making each person sat in their seats feel as though they were special, that it was a privilege to be swept along on the groove and moments in between.

This is Garry Christian’s great power, he puts people at such at ease that it is impossible to feel anything other than pleasure. Some find this and call it talent, others regrettably fake it, but some, a few are born with it and use it wisely; such is the grace of the band, that even in a short set as support to Belinda Carlisle, it is overwhelming, it is dominant, and it is beautiful.

A short set, but one of absolutes, and as Born Again opened the Saturday night in Scotland’s capital, and as the remains of Storm Otto lashed down on the ancient symbols of the city, so tracks and beliefs such as the heartfelt anger of Forgotten Town, Words, the impressive cover of Marvin Gaye’s Inner-City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler), Ideal World, Hooverville (And They Promised Us The World), and Harvest For The World all played out, it must be noted that the fullness and immensity of time was framed, for that anger, that smoothness pf voice, the sheer insight captured by the band, is still as strong as it ever was…and peace in the soul was felt for a little while in ancient lit corridors and monuments dedicated to the past.

It may have been a short set, but glorious it was in its delivery, The Christians were, and always are, a joy to travel anywhere to see.

Ian D. Hall