What better way is there to begin the year, or anything, than with the folky/pop orchestra Nimmo and the Gauntletts (NATG)? I doubt there is a better way because, genuinely, this is the real deal people; they are your winners. Can music ever get more complete than with NATG?When they give all they’ve got up on stage (and they do); it is a total experience of something incredible; that is what they give out and invite you to be. It probably won’t get better than this – they manage to leave you euphoric, wanting more.
Nimmo and the Gauntletts are wide-ranging in their music: emotional, witty and soulful. Their ability to stir up emotions that you didn’t know you had, felt or forgot about is epic. At recent gigs in Brighton and London, the band contrasts the new emotional song ‘Young Light’ with a jazzy classic ‘Bandol Blues’. University of Sussex students Sarah and Reva even makes some dance moves when performing which makes any audience groove too – if you are the
rhythm they’re right there with the beat or the other way around. That is how they communicate. Nimmo and the Gauntletts are able to make you blush as much as make you laugh.
The band with folk roots is on a melodic journey, standing tall and moving forward with the light switched on because they forgot to switch it off. Alas, it is more than a lucky shot, the dynamic fivesome: Sarah Nimmo and Reva Gauntlett (vocals, guitar), Hannah Rose (saxophone, keys), Joshua Faull (violin, bass) and Jack Williams (drums) fit ghostly well together. Is it a female telepathy between vocalists Sarah and Reva that works? Perhaps so, but it might also be the secret tunes from Joshua on the violin in ‘Woe is Me’ or Hannah and the sax induced love. On stage and in between songs: what Sarah does in words, Reva gently delivers in presence. It’s what they both are – how and why they go so well together with Joshua, Hannah and Jack.
Sarah speaks about the road forward for NATG that she and the band has accepted. She denies that Nimmo and the Gauntletts is “the next big thing in music”. But again, who knows and why not? They might as well be one of these big things. NATG is known for being supported by Strummerville. Now, they are taking two steps back to be able to stand on their own in the success. Waiting to catch the best opportunity for the band that will enable them to move in the right direction.
A line from their new material: ‘following fate I am love’s bait and you swim in my mind again’ seems to describe NATG’s road quite well and where they are at perhaps. Obviously, the band is on this exciting journey because they indeed belong here, starcrossed, as it were. It’s a band that will swim in your mind if you invite them to.
Listening to and experience Nimmo and the Gauntletts is like walking in the woods. It’s food for the soul. It’s what you thought you didn’t need but discovered that you wanted. It’s ‘Timeless Lust’ and puts a smile on your face.