Cassidy Paris / Bad Actress / We’re Not Scared of Robots - Bannerman’s Edinburgh 18th July 2024

21-year-old Aussie singer, Cassidy Paris put on a great show in Edinburgh the other night with an energetic, polished and powerful performance. The young lass really knows how to conduct herself on stage; displaying confidence, charm and stage craft, throwing shapes and always knowing exactly where the camera is, all while never missing a note. Despite her youth, she’s been on the scene for a few years now and has a great rock pedigree, but it was a joy to see it all coming together for her on the back of the excellent ‘New Sensation’ album which was released on Frontiers last year.

In Cassidy’s initial introduction, she announced “we’re Cassidy Paris” to emphasise that, although Cassidy herself is clearly the focal point, she’s got a full-time band on-board now, featuring young Welsh lads Alex and Tom Rogowski, who some folks might remember from the band Mad Haven. They are both a great fit for the job and bring more youthful energy and exuberance to the party. They are excellent players too, in fact Tom is so good on the guitar that Cassidy’s dad, the genial Steve Janevski of Wicked Smile, The Radio Sun and Black Majesty fame, is relegated to bass and mentoring duties, despite being one of Australia’s premier rock guitarists. He doesn’t mind though. He’s clearly having fun and rightfully enjoying some proud-father moments.

Naturally, most of the set is drawn from that fine debut album, starting with the sultry ‘Midnight Desire’, a ‘Black Velvet’ for the 21st century, which is also the song after which this tour is named. There are some absolute bangers on the album like the tub-thumping ‘Danger’, ‘Walking on Fire’ and ‘Addicted’ and they all get an outing. Cassidy’s performance and stage-craft are so advanced that she could easily dominate the pop charts or a TV show like ‘Pop Idol’, but that’s not going to happen, as she is a proper rock chick through-and-through - always has been and always will be. Tonight, she struts her stuff in an over-sized vintage Ratt tour t-shirt (not sure if it was one of her dad’s originally) and also reprised her version of Joan Jett’s ‘I Hate Myself for Loving You’.

Plans for the next album are still in the early stages but that will come out on Frontiers in due course, maybe next year. With Chez Kane and Issa also recording very fine albums recently, it really feels like there is a new wave of great female melodic rockers emerging around the world, with quality the likes of which we have not seen since the actual 1980s. There is much more to come from Ms Paris so keep an eye out down under for more great sounds.

I was a bit late to the party and so I only heard the last couple of songs from the memorably-named We’re Not Scared of Robots. From that very small sample size, my initial impression was that this might be what the Red Hot Chili Peppers would sound like if they came from Airdrie! Then again, one of my friends who saw the whole set picked up a hint of The Undertones too. In any event, they sounded pretty good, so if you like energetic alt-rock with a bit of swing and panache you might find

something you like here. Apparently, the band originate from Central Scotland and they have changed up their sound and introduced two new members recently. They have two Glasgow gigs lined up, firstly at Nice n’ Sleazy on 2nd August and then a day-time in-store performance at HMV on 7th September, which will both be worth checking out. I will definitely remember their name.

When I hear the name Bad Actress, I usually think of Vicky McClure (appears in well-written shows but totally wooden and only got one expression, mate – a bit like James Nesbitt). Of course, I’ve also seen the likeable Highland rockers of that name a few times and they have been opening for Cassidy Paris on the northern leg of the tour.

They have some excellent tunes and always put on a show, although they maybe don’t look quite as full-on glam rock as they used to, with only guitarist Chick and drummer Lui Q really looking like they might have been in Poison back in the day, but they still rock out with a touch of panache. Toby Michaels is a bit of a character on the vocals, coming over a bit like a slightly chunkier version of Baz from Massive Wagons. He slips an excerpt from ‘Bat Out of Hell’ into ‘Rockin’ with You’ and, after their cover of ABBA’s ‘’Does Your Mother Know’, he takes advantage of the fact that it hasn’t rained all that much today to go “taps aff” in celebration of the Scottish summer. Theirs was an enjoyable set, as always, and they liven up any event.