Ontaw Tour

Danny Gruff, Dave Giles, Lizzie Jane and Nick Kent

Manchester Sound Control and Wrexham Rewind

July 30th and 31st, 2015

Earlier this year I had the pleasure of meeting singer Danny Gruff.  

Danny is a lovely guy and when he announced his first ever headline tour we decided that we had to go.  The 'Ontaw Tour' consisted of five dates in Portsmouth, London, Birmingham, Manchester and finally a hometown show in Wrexham.  Initially we should only have been attending the Manchester show but later booked for the Wrexham show too.

Supporting Danny on his tour were Dave Giles, Nick Kent and, (for the two final shows), Lizzie Jane.

Opening each night was Nick Kent.  Nick is a singer, musician and photographer from London.  Nick has a good stage presence and a lovely voice and although I didn't know any of his songs until now, I found that I really enjoyed his performance. 

For me 'Primrose' and 'Serenade' were stand out songs and I was really happy to find that they were on his EP, 'Overdose On Fahrenheit'. 

Nick has a great talent and I really enjoyed both of his performances.

Next up was Lizzie Jane, a singer/songwriter from Manchester. 

I know I have said on my blog before that I have a dislike for female singers as I find they are too high pitched for my taste.  Lizzie Jane however, has managed to become one of the few female singers that I could listen to.  Her voice has a lovely lower pitched smoothness which at times is bluesy and at other times reminded me a little of Lily Allen, but overall I found her really easy to listen to.

Lizzie sang songs from her EP 'Monster', and cover versions of Candi Staton's 'Young Hearts Run Free' and Bruce Springsteen's 'I'm On Fire'.  However, for me my favourite song had to be 'I Don't Think So' which was a poke at today's music industry and 'talent' programmes like the X Factor. Lizzie gave an excellent performance both nights and I was so impressed that I even purchased her EP.

Dave Giles followed Lizzie with a very upbeat set.  Dave is a singer/songwriter who loves a good story, which was evident in his Manchester set as he explained the stories behind some of the songs. Personally I am always intrigued as to the background to songs so for me this was great!

Dave has quite a large back catalogue of songs and treated us to a good range of songs, from 'I Am What I Am', 'Whiskey and Wings' to 'Movies Suck'. 

For me the standout song of his set was 'Bangarang', as I have always been told that I have my head in the clouds and don't act my age.  At the Manchester show he performed this from the middle of the crowd and really got the crowd immersed in his performance.

Dave has a fantastic stage presence and I thoroughly enjoyed his performances.

Tonight's headliner is 25 year old Danny Gruff from London.  Danny has fantastic stage presence and his songs are brilliantly written and extremely catchy. 

Danny tried to keep the set slightly different each night but there were some of his songs that really stood out and got a great response from the audience such as 'The Hangover Song', 'Nine Hours', 'Pearly Whites' and my favourite 'Whiskey Legs'.  The set also included 'Smile' which had its own 'dance' and had the audience flapping their hands along to the chorus. 

On both of the evenings we attended, Danny played '62 Years', a beautiful ballad, which he explains is a tribute to his Grandmother and late Grandfather.

During his set he was joined on stage by Lizzie Jane who sang a beautiful song called 'Where My Heart Lies'.  He also had Nick Kent join him on stage for 'The Drinking Song' in Manchester (one of his friends joined him for this song in Wrexham), and the whole audience was encouraged to join in the drinking game. Basically when you hear the word drink, you take a drink of your pint.

During the last two songs of the set Danny was joined on stage by both Nick and Dave, and you really got the chance to see the friendship between these guys. 

The whole show was completely acoustic and it showed the absolute talent that they have as they had no band or loud guitars to hide behind.  I will definitely be going to see them again.

My only complaint from the shows I attended was the audience at the Wrexham show showed very little respect for the artists and insisted on talking loudly throughout the show. I've been to many shows and you usually expect a bit of talking during the show but not to this extent.  The atmosphere of this show was the complete opposite of the Manchester show which was                                                                                             really  intimate and enjoyable.

Danny set himself a challenge for 2015 when he announced that he planned to write and release one song every week for a whole year.  He has admitted it is easier said than done but Danny isn't the kind of guy to quit so we still have loads more new songs to look forward to.  Check him out on his YouTube page here: https://www.youtube.com/user/Dannygruff