The Outlaw Orchestra + Ross Harding & The Dark Hearts - The Old Brewery Store Faversham, Friday 14th February 2025

Initially, I wonder where Ross Harding has been hiding. Heading up a trio, Ross is a sharp looking man with some tasty riffs and an impressive voice, and I feel sure I should have heard of him. But then he speaks, and everything falls into place; a professional musician in South Africa for a decade, he’s starting over in the UK, having been here for about a year. He pokes fun at his self-proclaimed “funny accent” which disappears entirely when he sings, transitioning to something more akin to grunge; not quite Eddie Vedder’s distinctive ‘yarl’ but just as warm, with a little more rasp. Like all good power trios, the performance depends on a solid, grooving rhythm section, and thankfully drummer Reef Anslow and bassist Andrew Hollos have got that down. It’s their pummelling groove that helps make ‘Everything is Black’ an absolute monster, and the riff that resembles Muse’s ‘Psycho’ certainly doesn’t hurt. In contrast, 'London Blues' is appropriately melancholy, a reflection on our notoriously miserable weather that Harding quickly discovered on spending some time in the capital.

It’s hard to imagine that anyone has ever been to see The Outlaw Orchestra and hasn’t had a good time. An infectious sense of fun permeates their shows, largely thanks to frontman Dave ‘Rocker’ Roux - an excellent spinner of yarns, throwing out stories between songs as easily as he dispenses riffs. It’s why the band have affectionately named him ‘glovebox’ - “because he’s full of shit and you can’t shut him up!”. Without his interjections, we wouldn’t know that ‘Bag of Bones’ was inspired by a visit to the butchers where Roux was mistaken for a homeless man, or that ‘Too Much Willie Nelson’ wouldn’t exist if the band hadn’t been gifted a large amount of weed from the titular country superstar! But for every quirky anecdote, there’s a belter of a song, and these three are not to be underestimated as musicians. 

Pete Briley is a man of many talents, and consequently, many names - we hear him referred to as Banjo Pete, Powerslide Pete and Pedal Steel Pete as the evening progresses! His higher register vocals cut across Dave’s more countrified twang, providing harmonies throughout, and he’s a great presence, throwing shapes with his banjo like a guitar god. He trades the banjo out for a cigar-box guitar as the band rattle through ‘Rotten Apples’, a song so catchy that I’m still singing it in my head several days later. It’s a great showcase too for drummer Ryan Smith (aka ‘Thundersmith’) who is truly commanding behind the kit, driving every song with real conviction. Though he emerges briefly to shake a tambourine during the creeping ‘Voodoo Queen’, he’s back at the stool for a suitably thunderous crescendo. 

Always straddling genres, but far too rock and roll to really be considered country, there’s more diversity than you might expect in The Outlaw Orchestra oeuvre. Straight up rockers like the anthemic ‘Outlaw’ and foot-stomping ‘Small Change’ rub shoulders with the brooding ‘Born to Be a Thief’ and Blackberry Smoke-esque ‘S.O.S.’ (though the band describe it as a cross between ‘Beating Around the Bush’ and ‘Walk This Way’ which I can definitely hear!). An enthusiastic cover of Joe Walsh’s ‘Rocky Mountain Way’ is given the Outlaw treatment, and though they feign it’s their first attempt, I suspect they might be fibbing! 

Once again, a local venue proves to be a winning night out. It's not been a romantic Valentine's, but it's been a lot of fun. And it's difficult to think of two bands I'd rather have spent the evening with.