Like a pearl within an oyster, Abbe May and Clam Jam proved to be a secret treasure within the Adelaide Guitar Festival.
Abbe May herself claims to have hit upon the idea of the Clam Jam one night, wondering why all the music festivals still boasted all male headliners, so the Clam Jam was created to showcase and focus on women in music. For Festival goers, it was a rare chance to see some of our best contemporary female talents mix and match their skills, producing some intense sounds and powerful moments.
Annie Siegmann, as musical director and 'bassist of a thousand bass faces', put together The Limpettes as the house band for the night, consisting of herself, Jessie-Lee (Hana and Jessie-Lee) on guitars and Holly Thomas (Vincent's Chair) on drums. They must have been the hardest working band in Australia in the lead up to this gig, as the rehearsal schedule would have been loaded with the learning and arranging of a sparkling array of covers and original songs.
One of the featured acts was W.M.N (pronounced woman) comprising of Daye Jung, Lucie Vano, Wallis Prophet, and Ella Moeck, who presented a special blend of R'n'B, urban beats, floating strings, and haunting fragile vocals with immaculate harmonies. Their second song, their MA-rated Eros-Rap, saw a dreamy distant violin vying with Jessie-Lee's crisp Knopfler-esque lead lines.
The "perpetually stoked" Cookie Baker was up next. Strumming her Maton 6 string guitar, her country-tinged vocals coaxed a big sound from the Limpettes. Her slow bluesy groove evinced a scorching solo from Jessie Lee with her trademark green Gretsch, Bigsby-equipped, archtop, with the rolling dice knobs.
The next band was the little known Sour Trout, comprising singer-songwriter, Kate Alexander, joined by The Limpettes and Hana Brenecka. Strumming, and sometimes clawing at her sparkle-green Gretsch, Kate in her 'My wife is awesome' singlet combined melodic-harmony verses, fiery choruses and wall-of-sound interludes.
Alana Jagt, with a voice somewhere between Janis Joplin and Joni Mitchell, brought us some nice fingerpicking acoustic, while Jessie-Lee somehow drew clean, almost lap-steel-like sound from her butterscotch blonde Telecaster.
Magically, with the return of Hana to centre-stage, the Limpettes were transformed into another incarnation of Hana and Jessie-Lee. Nominated for best live vocals in SA, best country band, and having supported Cold Chisel and Kasey Chambers, they are quite capable of tearing up the stage with twangy alt-country grooves.
The Clam Jam, an exposition of exclusively female talent, concluded with Abbe May's own performance, first with The Limpettes, and then solo with drum loops and sounds. Abbe's matt black Gibson hollow body became a 'machine to kill fascists' as she wove her intoxicating spell of sex-politik through a grungy cloud of feedback and smoky late night vocals. Her cover of Ginuwine's Pony had some of the audience up and grinding with air guitars, while her swapping of hot leads with Jessie-Lee proved once and for all you don't need to be male to rock hard.
All in all an impressive display of how much talent can be assembled in one place to transform music and, ultimately, society.
Reviewed by Unjay Markiewicz, Saturday 11th August 2018.