The Royal Albert Hall is a magnificent venue, although I bet when it was planned, built and opened it was never imagined that cowboy and cowchicks would be in attendance, both in the audience and on stage! But for a few years now there has been, especially for Highways festival which was in its fourth year.
This year it was over three nights, but I only went Friday and Saturday, I missed Sunday. The thing that struck me the most over the two days was how honoured most of the acts were to be appearing in this iconic venue. Many of the acts likened it not only to the Grand Ole Opry (who staged a show there last year as part of their 100th birthday) but also to a magnificent church.
On Saturday the first act on stage was Clover County. This was her first ever visit to the UK, she had played some dates leading up to the festival with Jack Van Cleaf who had played Highways Friday night. Today it was just Clover and her guitar, no band. Her voice was soft and melodic, but her set was too slow and she unfortunately she failed to really engage the audience. She was wearing a really cute little dress and she did comment that she had just noticed her dress matched her guitar and she hadn’t realised that when she put the dress on!
Next up were Tigirlily Gold (sisters Kendra Olson and Krista Slaubaugh). I had high hope of them rousing the audience so I was really rather concerned to see two stools on the stage before they came on. I was concerned unnecessarily, it appeared the stools were in case of emergency, but were surplus to requirements and were not used! Last time I saw these girls was at the After Party at C2C in 2024, they were excited to be back and to be playing RAH, they went as far as to say it is the most beautiful venue they have ever played. The close bond between the sisters was really apparent and quite honestly a joy to watch!
At one point they said that they had heard the Brits are good singers, there were a couple of loud whoops, to which Kendra said “Well two of you are anyway!” They sang ‘Keep Bleeding’ and asked us to join in. Before singing the very last note they paused for a millosecond, an audience member however did not and continued with the last note loud and clear! That was quite amusing!
Corey Kent was the penultimate act for the night. I wasn’t really sure what to expect as the last time I saw Corey he was supporting Ashley McBryde in Southampton. Then it was just him and a guitarist sat on a stools and Corey was wearing a big old fisherman style jumper, which he didn’t remove! He came on with a band this time though! My friend immediately commented that Corey was dressed all in white while his band were all in black! Not only that, I immediately noticed not just one band member, not even two, but three of them were wearing dungarees without tee shirts underneath. Think I noticed this because the night before Kaitlin Butts Fiddle player had worn a similar outfit and Kaitlin had commented that she bet it was the first time the RAH had had a man in coveralls on the stage performing! One yesterday, three today!
Corey said what an absolute honour it was to be playing the RAH, although he did say it was his 4th year in a row in the UK and the 4th year he had been struggling with his voice, to be fair it didn’t sound to me as if he was struggling, so he struggled well!
His set was energetic and fun. The band were enjoying themselves as much as Corey was – or they appeared to be! An Oasis cover – ‘Champagne Supernova’ was included in the set. I have always hated Oasis, even back in the day, so I am afraid I always groan when an Oasis cover is played, however Corey wasn’t to know that!
Finally it was the turn of Carly Pearce. Curiously Baylen Leonard, who was compering the event didn’t actually introduce Carly, obviously she needs no introduction! She was wearing a long floaty dress which she happily swung around in. She also spent a lot of time waving to members of the audience and even posed for a couple of photos for audience members while she was singing.
She told us we were going on a journey that night and that most of the songs she was going to sing she had written through the good the bad and the ugly, I think she meant in her life, not during the film! (What a Grandad thing to say lol!!)
After singing ‘Next Girl’ my friend commented you wouldn’t want to be one of Carly’s exes, you would end up immortalised forever!
Before she sang We Don’t Fight Anymore, she said when she wrote it she had Chris Stapleton in mind, so when she finished it she DM’d Chris’ wife Morgane to arrange it!
During ‘Never Wanted to Be That Girl’, I got slightly distracted as the couple in front of us were obviously on a first date (we had worked that out a while back) but at this point he did the classic lean back, stretch & drop his arm around her shoulders. I caught it out of the side of my eye & I am really sorry but I got the giggles over it!!
By now some of the crowd were up and dancing, but not many, but Carly also wasn’t really encouraging people to stand and dance, she even referred to the fact that we were a polite crowd!
Towards the end of her set Carly paid tribute to Bob Harris saying he bought her over for C2C in 2018, she thanked him for his support for both her and for Country music in the UK. I know a guy down near the front recorded this and sent it through to a couple of people so it did get to Bob and he did see it. Hopefully it boosted his spirits as he isn’t in the best of health at the moment. (Get well soon Bob!)
Her band was introduced to us with Carly saying they were a family, the band were her brothers and she was the sister they never wanted! I didn’t hear any of the boys disagreeing! Lol!
Carly was ecstatic when she told us this was the first time in her life she had headlined a festival. I am sure I was not the only person in the audience to be shocked at that news, I would have thought with all the festivals in the States that she must have headlined one by now, but nope, her first festival headline performance was in London. She spoke about all the sacrifices she made while chasing her dreams and how chasing a dream wasn’t always pretty. She then sang ‘Dream Come True’ during which at one point she got down on her knees.
She then left the stage, but she hadn’t said goodnight, so we all stayed put! Sure enough she came back on stage, she then spoke directly to two young girls in the front row who were 9 and 10, told them to believe in themselves and to stay true to themselves, if it was in their heart they should chase it. ‘What He Didn’t Do’ closed the show.
I throughly enjoyed not just Carly’s set but the whole two days. Unfortunately there were quite a lot of empty seats and a lot of people left during Carly’s set … including the woman in front of us who was on the date! However I know there were some issue with transport that night and indeed another friend of mine didn’t get home until 2 am due to his tube line being shut! I very much hope Highways will be back next year.