US singer-songwriter Terra Naomi was one of the first artistes to gain success via You Tube, with her track “Say It’s Possible” winning the network's music video of the year in 2007, leading to Island Records releasing Terra's album Under The Influence and an appearance at the UK leg of Live Earth a few months down the line.

In the years that followed Terra and Island parted ways. This led to the singer deciding to record her next album with the help of her numerous fans, using the Pledgemusic website, offering her followers a variety of goodies including signed CDs, a bag of the singer’s favourite road food, Terra’s first acoustic guitar and a private concert at 37,000 feet, depending on how much they pledged. The decision to go in the Pledgemusic direction was a wise move as it was a resounding success, with the singer ending up with 135% of the money needed, enabling Terra to release To Know I’m OK in 2011 .

Terra has played several shows introducing the songs to a live audience since its release and showed up in London for a date that was part of a European tour, performing at Islington’s Assembly Hall, the singer's first show in the capital in three and a half years. The venue has only recently begun promoting gigs in a big way and it was my first visit to the spacious theatre, which was set out with tables in the stalls section, with further seats in the balcony above. As luck would have it one of my regular gig going acquaintances had grabbed a table right in front of the stage, so I set up camp there and got to grips with the lay of the land while shooting support – Welsh duo Paper Aeroplanes.

The pair had been on my radar for a while but I’d never seen them before and I came away from their set contemplating catching them again sometime down the line as they had a few decent songs, especially ‘My First Love’, a track that really blew me away.



I hadn’t been keeping tabs on what Miss Naomi had been up to on this tour so wasn’t sure whether she’d be playing solo or with additional musicians. I was delighted when a solitary figure appeared on stage as I love stripped down sets as I’m a musician myself and can really appreciate hearing a performer just playing the bare bones of a song.

Terra flitted between keyboard and guitar throughout the night, delivering songs from both her albums, a couple of new tracks and a trio of covers, starting the evening with ‘I Could Stay’ from her current collection.

I was surprised that Terra unleashed a couple of her more well known songs early in the proceedings, with ‘The Vicodin Song’ - dedicated to two different Laura’s (or was it the same one?!) and ‘Say It’s Possible’ both appearing near the beginning, alongside an exquisite slowed down version of one of my Naomi faves - 'Jenny'.



Terra chatted to the audience throughout the evening, regaling us all with various tales, including the slightly embarrassing time she had to watch an awkward sex scene from indie movie Super on a loop, sitting with the movie's editor while trying to compose a song for the scene, coming up with the moving 'Someday Soon', only for the film makers to go with another song in the end. They did use one of Terra's though so I'm sure it was worth it!

The singer had the audience captivated throughout the night with the tracks from her albums but two of the stand out songs of the evening came in the form of a new composition and a cover version. New song 'A Ring is Just a Ring' - a track about "the things that are important in life" pulled at the heartstrings and Terra's cover of the Michael Jackson classic 'Billie Jean' was just sumptuous, with Terra's haunting delivery of the verses making you sit up and listen to every word of the song, which was fairly easy at the Islington venue as they seemed to be blessed with an extremly clear sound system!

Terra seemed to have an very fluid set list and kept changing her mind as to what she wanted to play, darting between her guitars and keyboard, knocking a guitar stand down in the process, which led to a bit of a running joke throughout the evening. Whatever she played went down well with the extremely appreciative audience, which must have been a great feeling for the singer as she'd previously mentioned that she had been looking forward to the London show the whole tour and couldn’t remember when she’d been so excited about a gig.

Sadly, the set couldn't last forever, even though Terra said she'd be happy to play all the songs again, so the set ended with a track from To Know I'm OK - 'I'll Be Waiting', followed by an inevitable encore, giving Miss Naomi a chance to wow us all again with a cover of the Alexandra Burke masterpiece 'Hallelujah' (only joking music purists!) and 'Flesh For Bones' wrapping the evening up good style!

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder but I hope I get the chance to see Terra in London again before 2015 as her live set was a bit of a joy.