Live Review: Mark Wilkinson - Fly By Night

It’s been good times for Australian independent artist Mark Wilkinson with the release of his new album, Let The River Run, in August last year shooting to #2 on the Australian iTunes singer-songwriter charts within 24 hours, as well as recently being named the Discovery of the Year in North America and of course now returning to Perth to play the Fly by Night in the middle of his Australian tour.

There was an easy atmosphere to the evening, and Wilkinson opened with Baptism By Fire, followed by a playlist of old favourites and plenty of new. He truly has a gift for poetic lyrics, describing emotional places you have once been or seen. There’s a glow of warmth around him and richness to his supreme voice, sending shivers down spines as he pulls you into the soul of him. Wilkinson was easy with the crowd, chatting now and again about how he came about his lyrics, and by Hey Baby he hoped the audience was “lubricated enough” to join in for a singalong… at least that’s what we hoped he was referring to. Most joined in with the sound of palms coming together.

Setting off in the wrong key for Let The River Run was ironic having just talked to the crowd about how the song is representative of “letting go” of his “control freak ways”,  Wilkinson finished the set with All I Ever Wanted and a big thank you to Perth before returning to encore with Middle Ground. Then after relaying and joking to the crowd about how he is often referred to as sounding more like Tracy Chapman than she does, he went on to sing an outstanding version of Fast Car as a one-man band, with the spotlight sat on him and his acoustic guitar alone, piano and cello returning for the final song of the night, Should’ve Been.

Let The River Run is a touching and soulful album and tracks from it were delivered with love and tender care. Mark Wilkinson is a charismatic and deeply talented acoustic artist.