Sam Millar /The Devil’s Forfeit - Bannerman’s Edinburgh, 6th December 2024

Fortunately, The Devil’s Forfeit were on hand to warm the cockles of the heart, not least singer Angela Grace, who was a veritable ray of sunshine in a bright red top. The four-piece band have been together for about a year now and hail from Edinburgh and the Scottish Borders. They specialise in old school bluesy-rock but with a few musical spritzers. ‘Outer Lines’ was a notably good song and ‘Wonder’ was one “to get your groovin’ shoes on” for, as Angela correctly stated. Whilst the focus is inevitably drawn to the eye-catching singer, the boys in the band have got something going on too. One of the songs had an almost Strokes-ian riff and bass line and there was another with a dreamy ‘Last Dance with Mary Jane’ feel. Guitarist Elliot Waugh even got to sing part of a song that might have been called ‘Hold Your Breath’. On the day of the gig, the band had released a new single entitled ‘For the Money’ which Angela got the tambourine out for while the rest of the band took the music to the Bayou for some down south jukin’. Their last song of an entertaining and well-received set was ‘Playing with Fire’ and I think having The Devil’s Forfeit as a support band would be a very welcome addition to any line-up in 2025.

Towards the end of the support slot, Angela asked the crowd if they were looking forward to Sam Millar? “Aye – he’s a sexy wee man” was one response and the former Bigfoot singer certainly looked the part as he took to the stage with his shirt / blouse open to the navel. Naturally, most of the set came from the ‘Virtual Summer’ album – a sneakily good record that generally dwells on the sunny side of rock music, although he started with ‘The Killing Floor’ before moving onto ‘Fooling Yourself’ and the wonderful “woah-oh-ohs” of “Something I’ll Regret”.

It was clear that all was not well though, even before Sam announced that he was “not having a good day”. This was almost certainly to do with a weird sound mix that had the vocals submerged and Sam was clearly having trouble even hearing himself. A round of fireball shots for the band briefly lifted the spirits a bit before Sam introduced ‘Forbidden’ as a song about “having a big fat w*nk in a bathtub” and I needed some fireballs too after that just to get ‘Saltburn’ TV flashbacks out of my head.

The band were very audible though, especially the drums, and Benji Faith played a stormer on the bass; playing well, throwing shapes, hair-twirling like a good ‘un and even venturing into the crowd for a bit of a play around. Back on stage, the great songs kept coming, like the very modern break-up song ‘Showbiz’, the throbbing intro to ‘Déjà vu’ that seemed very familiar and ‘Chardonnay’ – the obligatory girl’s name song with the bonus posh bevvy reference. It’s just a shame that the singing was verging on inaudible as these songs were crying out for a big stage, big lead vocals and even bigger backing vocals.

The last song was ‘Neanderthal Man’ and you just knew there wasn’t going to be an encore in the circumstances. To be fair, it is unusual for bands to suffer bad sound at Bannerman's but tonight it was a case of regret for what could have been. Despite a night to largely forget, I would heartily recommend ‘Virtual Summer’ as a bright and fluffy antidote to the winter blues and a worthy addition to your Santa list. I remember seeing another Sam – Sam Ryder – playing to a tiny crowd at HRH AOR in Rotherham with his melodic metal-core band The Morning After, long before he broke through via Eurovision and Space Man. I think Sam Millar might also have the talent, sass and charisma to break-out and I’ll certainly be watching out for another chance to see Sam and his band live in better circumstances.