Alice Armstrong band at the Tuesday Night Music Club Coulsdon May

This review was written By Nigel Foster. Photos By Ken Jackson

Alice Armstrong band at the Tuesday Night Music Club Coulsdon May

Alice Armstrong – The Tuesday Night Music Club – 27 May 2025 The Tuesday Night Music club is a multi award winner and for me there are 3 main reasons for this. Of course there is the high quality music that Richard Dunning brings us every week. In doing this Richard is giving independent artists a terrific platform to showcase their talents. Finally and just as important, Richard and Rosalind have created a music family where everyone is made to feel welcome.

There are 2 reasons for my unusual preamble and if and when Alice Armstrong reads this and picks up my sentiments she may let me get away with devoting space to these reasons within a review of the magnificent performance she and her top flight band delivered tonight. For the now 10+ years the club has been in existence my very dear friend and everybody’s friend, Haydn Hart has been a pillar of the club. In that time he has hardly missed a gig and Haydn also goes out of his way to make new visitors welcome.

The reputation and pull of the club I think it is so lovely that out of all the places you can could visit here to see live music a pretty much unknown town well away from the lights of London. So to tonight’s music and it was clear witnessing the fizz and buzz of Alice and her “Boy Band’ that they are still riding the wave created by their win at the Olly Knight-Smith European Blues Awards. The Boy Band, as Alice refers to them as her boys, are everyone’s favourite keysman Stevie Watts ever popular drummer Kev HickmanJoshua Rigal on the bass guitar and Olly Knight-Smith on lead guitar.

Then Alice, the leading lady in every sense, a voice of power and passion, rapidly maturing song writing skills and an entertaining and warm stage presence. No surprise at all that some days ago Richard put out the ‘Sold Out’ signs up. The band performed two dynamic sets that featured blues heavily, traditional blues, blues rock and lashings of funky blues. The quintet made their way to the stage, selected their weapons of choice and dialled in immediately. Kev and Josh blended together to create the rhythm and Stevie chimed in with sweeps of the keyboard all providing a platform for `Alice to strut her vocal stuff and that she did when delivering a soul infused vocal. Olly moved through the song slapping strings of the Fender Strat to fill the void between Alice and her boys.

The band’s blues credentials were perfectly captured in the true slow blues tempo of Scratching Walls with the deep rhythm section sounds pushing on Stevie’s strident keys and Olly’s weaving lead breaks. Olly then ruptured the melody with a gut wrenching bold solo. Such is the confidence in the band right now they have been writing new material and much of it was shared including Bombshell, the lyric depicting a dangerous woman. The band pumped out driving instrumentation and Alice adopted the sassy siren mode singing with total conviction. Blood In The Water captured my full attention, another slow blues beauty built on a low slung engine room groove, deep thick keys and mournful languid guitar lines from Olly.

Urged on by the music Alice poured out gospel style pleadings in her voice. Alice introduced Punchline from her forthcoming EP and the new single from it. Olly flooded out a beautiful guitar intro of pure clean notes that lay under Alice’s almost spoken vocal that gradually rose in volume and power as the whole band chimed and she pinned us back in our seats as she unleashed the full power of her voice as it depicted the lyrics. The belligerent Auto Assassin, another new song, ended the opening set, this was an absolute riot of sounds, locked out rhythm section patterns, booming keys and a scorching power drive solo from Olly had Alice throwing down a wrought and wailing vocal. The second set started much more gently with the lovely ballad Love Song. Olly and Stevie only joined Alice and their interplay of deft fingerpicking picking from Olly and delicate piano sweeps from Stevie rested beside Alice’s hurting rich layers of vocals.

Alice and the band then really hit the gas and carved out 3 consecutive songs with furious funk to the fore. Cher’s Bang Bang and band originals Crystals and Pearls and Rock Steady throbbed as the drums and bass plunged the depths for the groove, Stevie punched out heavy keys and Olly hit the Wah Wah pedal grinding out switchblade riffs and Alice punched through the sonics with a soul riven and powerful voice. B Side brought the vibe down as it opened out as another slice of slow blues. The lyrics and song Alice’s homage to BB King. Imagine a dark underground blues club with its air thick with smoke and the constant chink of glasses and you have this number sussed. A stretched rhythm section pulsed away lifting up Alice’s honey rich and thick voice and then Stevie took the lead with a mesmerising solo where his hands raced so fast across the keys they were a blur. Set closer Speed Dial, in tribute to Matt Long and the deserved encore of Your Guess were a gigantic celebration of all that is so special about Alice and ‘her boys.’

Cue massive audience participation for Speed Dial thrown over Josh’s dirty bass lines and the repeating drum beats. While Alice gave the boys the spotlight on Your Guess and each threw out a crunching power driven solo. Stevie thumping keys at pace, Josh throwing down thick bass lines, Olly carving out a scorched solo and Kev, just about the most demonstrative drummer on the circuit working across his kit keeping perfect time. A sustained genuine standing ovation hopefully demonstrated our appreciation. I go out where I came in with a question for Haydn; ‘who takes on the TNMC mantle of selfie model to the stars????