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Kings Place, LondonTwo years on from the death of her friend and musical collaborator Eric Littmann, Byrne tours the album they were working on together, in a performance of mesmerising beautyEven before tragedy struck, Julie Byrne’s voice, it seems, was ready for it. A resonant, husky instrument, full of wisdom and velvety consolation, it had been fully formed from the time of the US folk singer’s earliest available recordings – 2014’s Rooms With Walls and Windows, which compiled a pair of cassette-only EPs the itinerant singer sold at gigs and DIY events. Accompanied by her own accomplished finger-picking, the numinous style of Byrne’s sketches faintly recalled Cat Power. Byrne’s sure grasp of the cloudy poetry of interpersonal relationships, meanwhile, suggested a familiarity with the Leonard Cohen songbook.Nearly a decade later, Byrne, now 33, is touring a blockbuster of an album made of love, friendship and grief – The Greater Wings, released earlier this month to constellations of reviewer stars. These are songs full of elegiac ache for her former bandmate and ex-partner, Eric Littmann, who died suddenly in 2021, some way through writing and recording the album. (The album was finished with the help of friends and producer Alex Somers, formerly of duo Jónsi and Alex, with Sigur Rós’s lead singer.) Continue reading...