Seth Lakeman at Cardiff Student Union

Very strange to be back in my old Student Union. I haven't been there since 1996, when I had my first wedding reception disco in the Staff Dining Club!
Its music venue which I knew as the Hanging Gardens is now Solus. It was all quite dark in there, with black parachute-style curtains hanging from the ceiling. Seth suffered from bad sound at the start - we couldn't hear his introductions for the songs, let alone his singing! The sound improved as the gig went on, but it was still not very good.
Seth played a lot of his early stuff, including the famous Kitty Jay, Setting of the Sun (his take on the Molly Bond ghost song), Fight for Favour, Rifle Men of War and Take No Rogues. Of course his mining disaster song, The Colliers, was best received with the predominantly Welsh audience.
Though I loved Kitty Jay and Freedom Fields, I thought Seth's new material was a bit disappointing. Poor Man's Heaven seemed a bit patronising and the song about the stone circle a bit run-of-the-mill. Perhaps it's inevitable that later albums seem samey - it must be hard to be as innovative with each album.
That said, Seth still has a huge following for a folk artist, and has doubtlessly introduced folk music to a lot of younger people who would otherwise have regarded folk music as naff. More strength to his fiddling elbow!