Live Review: Moriarty

Moriarty's music and history make them the ultimate in-betweeners. With most of the band members born in Paris to American parents, and a rich and diverse array of cultural heritage, their brand of French Americana blues is hard to pigeonhole. Named after Jack Kerouac's iconic character from On The Road, Moriarty's music has the same wandering and restless spirit. Sweet and sultry chanteuse Rosemary Standley has a voice like honey and wildfire, transforming from a country croon in the first few saccharine ballads to a rocksteady blaze by the end of the set. Standley singing into a harmonica mic for one song is particularly beautiful and bizarre as the mic adds a fuzzy metallic ring to her voice, suddenly transporting the audience to a prohibition-era basement in America.

Harmonica, double bass, a resonator acoustic guitar and even a mouth harp add to the band's Americana vibe as the ensemble move effortlessly from folk and blues to a rock'n'roll ending. Starting off with a soft and silky murder ballad making the most of Standley's voice and underpinning it with incredibly haunting and skillful harmonica, the band are pulling heartstrings early.

There is a charming and unselfconscious rough edge to the opening few songs, and Standley is clad in a loose floral frock channelling a sweet country lass. Moriarty are master storytellers, and ballads are their medium of choice. There is a distinctly tragic edge to much of their material, and even through dulcet tones and the acoustic sway of strings a sinister undercurrent sweeps through their songs. Private Lily follows a 19-year-old woman joining the army and getting ready to tote an M16, and Whiteman's Ballad is a cynical look at corporate greed, corruption and human fallibility.

Standley's costume change into a tight red pencil skirt toward the end of the set marks the distinctive move into more gritty and sensual rock and is an order for the audience to dance. After the last notes ring out, an invigorated audience spill out of the Spiegeltent aware of life's tragic potential but more than ready for it.