To promote his autobiography, Tim Burgess lead singer of The Charlatans appeared at St. James's Church in Piccadilly, London. Over the last 3 years I have seen The Charlatans live in a number of different type of venues. The rain of Guilfest, the splendour of The Roundhouse, the intimacy of an Oxfam shop and the high energy Brixton Academy. This event really was something different as the audience got to hear Tim read from his book, endure a question and answer session and then get back to where he is comfortable at by performing a few songs. The church setting was beautiful right in the heart of the West End of London, and it was interesting to hear the occasional expletive ring out in the hallowed chamber!
One of the other bonuses about the evening was getting a signed copy of the book on arrival and judging by a quick flick through and from Tim's recital it promises to be a great read as the book pulls no punches addressing all the issues the fans will want to read about, but without losing a sense of humour. He admitted to feeling nervous about doing the readings, but it was brilliant and great to hear the words spoken by the author.
The Q&A session was both entertaining and quite poignant as it couldn't have been easy for Tim to answer questions about some of the darker times documented in the book.
The 5 song acoustic set was a great end to the evening with Tim being joined by Mark Collins. They played "The Only One I Know" and "Impossible" plus songs from Tim's forthcoming solo album.
There is sometimes more to music than just listening to the records and going to the gigs, and this event was a great way to get a unique insight into a great musician.
