Sat October 21, 2007 John Prine at Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Scotland
Opening: Dan Reeder -- Band: Jason Wilber and Dave Jacques

By: ROB ADAMS
John Prine, Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow
   October 23 2007 - full review and comments -- here
   He is, by his own admission, still learning to play the guitar. It's a state of affairs that his, shall we say, enthusiastic stroking of an electric guitar during a mercifully brief let's-be-a-bar band interlude would confirm. John Prine has never been about musical sophistication, though.
   Prine's great talent lies in communicating wisdom and his responses to things that affect us all in a way that registers, lyrically and melodically, with the man and woman in the street. He says the simple things brilliantly and memorably, as the almost serial instances of audience singalongs bore out here.
   Of course, his songs' longevity aren't hindered by history repeating itself. There are characters in Prine's domestic dramas who were involved in the Korean war and Vietnam, and who knows how many soldiers who weren't even born when Prine wrote of Sam Stone's post-combat stress and addiction will go through the same hell?
   Prine conveys this as well as reminders that patriotism doesn't guarantee entry to heaven, observations on career mobility and reflections on true love with a canny mixture of humanity and humour in a voice that reeks of honesty.
   With his familiar guitar/mandolin and bass team adding punch, flair and rockabilly-country-blues detail, he rattles through a catalogue whose consistency is remarkable. As good as the trio sounds, though, with the aforementioned exception, it's the Prine and guitar alone sequence that perhaps stands out. It's not an image that'll please everyone but the idea of a teenage Jesus sharing the bill with Tammy Wynette and George Jones during the grand tour that the Bible omitted still tickles your reviewer every time.
  
By: Jimmy Doak
When you have been waiting a fair while to see someone there’s a chance your expectation will get the better of you and set you up for a fall. No chance here. Songs choc with character and humanity : love and passion; laughter and tears; religion and politics; doomed youth and old age; families and loners ; good luck and cruel fate ; the road and home. I’ve never been to a concert where so many people around me were so visibly moved by the performance they were witnessing. An evening in the company of John Prine and his magic band managed to restore my faith in just about everything in music worth having faith in. Thanks John. I won’t be leaving it 35 years to the next one
 
By: Pete Farmer, Kilbirnie, Scotland
Once again the Maestro pulls another one out of the hat! I've been a fan since the day I bought the sampler album, The Age of Atlantic, in 1971 and heard 'Sam Stone' for the first time! Last night we were treated to all the classics and one I'd never heard him sing in concert before, from the 'Diamonds in the Rough' album, 'The Great Compromise'! Great! Haste ye back, John!

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