Review | Beans on Toast at The Wedgewood Rooms, Southsea: 'Always raucous affairs'

There is a setlist – I know, I saw it – but Beans’ mainman Jay McAllister is soon taking requests, playing half-remembered tracks from one of his 14 albums that he’s not played in years, or trying to play songs so new they’re not even finished yet.

As is Beans’ tradition, a new album comes out each December 1 – his birthday. Having brought out two at once in 2020, Jay had worked the pandemic out of his songwriting system.

As a result his 2021 effort, Survival of The Friendliest is an upbeat, chipper affair that focuses on the positives in life.

The Wedge has long been a regular stop on the tour that (pandemic aside) follows each release.

And so, for his first gig in Southsea for a while, the opening salvo is tunes from the latest album – including recent singles, A Beautiful Place and Not Everybody Thinks We’re Doomed.

Jay also promises – to great cheers form the audience – that we’re going to forget everything else that’s going on in the world for the next hour and a half and just enjoy life.

For much of the gig Jay is flanked by guitarist Jack Flanagan (moonlighting from indie-rockers Mystery Jets) and Kitty Liv on bass and harmonica (who also impressed as the evening’s support act) Jay is often freed up to prowl the stage, and for one memorable stint, sing from in among the crowd.

But for a lengthy mid-section, they leave Jay, and it’s here that the set really freestyles.

Beans gigs are always packed with laugh-aloud anecdotes to back up his indie-folk songs, and this is no exception.

Tonight we learn that the baby-faced Jack was asked for ID not once but twice in a Southsea pub before the gig, prompting a game with the audience of guess Jack’s age (29, apparently); how trying to teach his toddler-aged daughter about classic albums was a fool’s game; and why he ended up talking to another dad at a three-year-old’s birthday about why Frozen 2 is about colonialism.

Perhaps his best known song, MDMAmazing, gets a running commentary about which bits are true and which are fantasy. It’s a real-time deconstruction which takes an already amusing song, more than familiar to fans, and takes it to interesting new places.

The night’s sole cover is The Doors’ Break on Through, which is far removed from the original. Delivered in spirited fashion it’s fun, but far from essential.

And there is of course a bit of politics – from the broad brushstrokes of War on War to a new one about Southern Water, reflecting Jay’s newfound interest in local politics now that he lives on the Kent coast and was horrified to discover what the company was doing with its waste. The latter goes down well with a Southsea crowd.

The latter song is part of a lengthy encore section which features a shout-out for Portsmouth musician and producer Tristan Ivemy. Tristan produced Jay’s 2017 album Cushty, and is in the house, with Jay claiming ‘But I can’t remember any of the songs off the album!’

He finally launches into that album’s single Jamie and Lily, the touching story of a pair of superfans’ love for each other, noting: ‘We need to rehearse this one anyway, because I’m in Brighton tomorrow, and they’ll be there...’

The night finishes, fittingly enough with On and On – a song about facing life’s challenges regardless of what the world throws at you.

Same time next year, yeah?

A message from the Editor, Mark Waldron

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