The Lancashire Hotpots Review
The Lancashire Hotpots
Reviewed by Catherine Joyce
If your idea of folk music is hairy, middle aged men playing accordions in darkened pubs, well think again, folk has changed! The Lancashire Hotpots have certainly brought new life to folk music and their performance last night at The Lowry, Salford Quays certainly changed my mind about folk music. Whilst I was aware of The Lancashire Hotpots and have listened to one of their CD’s I didn’t realise that they had such a following. The audience was a sea of flat caps, florescent jackets and multi-coloured waistcoats and was made up of a huge mix of people, from the young to the very old, all enthusiastically joining in with the catchy songs.
The group is made up of Bernard Thresher (Vocals and Lead Guitar), Dickie Ticker (Percussion), Bob Wriggles (Bass), Kenny Body (Drums) and Billy McCartney (Keyboards) and they all put on a fantastic performance which certainly surpassed our expectations. There was a variety of costume changes, which added to the enjoyment of the show and from the opening song to the end of the show we never stopped laughing.
The show started with a song titled Wigan Church of Pies which is a track on their latest album, Crust for Life and the energetic track set the standard for the rest of the night. A swift costume change by Bernard into a pirate had us all singing Cinema Smugglers followed by A Perfect Pint which had us all on our feet bobbing up and down, going faster as the song speeded up. Other highlights were Chippy Tea, I Fear Ikea, The Beer Olympics and The Baking Song.
The band weren’t just good musicians, they were great entertainers too and there was plenty of banter, jokes and even an attempt at ventriloquism. I would certainly recommend seeing them live as we had such a fantastic night out and one we will remember for a long time.
We enjoyed the show so much we purchased the entire catalogue of CD’s and listened to them all the way home and most of today!
Rating: 5/5 
For more deails of shows at The Lowry visit www.thelowry.com
For more information. tour dates or to book tickets visit thelancashirehotpots.net/events
