★★★

This gig felt ultimately disappointing, although it should be stressed that many of the factors for this were nothing to do with Mississippi-born songwriter John Murry.

In a sense it is admirable that The Hope & Ruin is devoted to showcasing musicians on both floors of the building, but when two acts are playing at the same time, and two acts of such drastically different nature, a problem arises.

Playing an acoustic guitar with light backing on keyboard, it was often difficult to concentrate fully on Murry’s set with the occasionally heavy bass from the performance below throbbing through the floorboards.

The musician responsible for that set, The Rebel, drew a considerably larger crowd than Murry (maybe in part because the former’s show was free) which was another detractor from Murry’s gig – the thinness of the audience was all too evident.

Murry started with an intriguing medley, maintaining a steady, strummed rhythm while he sang lines from Blue Moon, Spiritualized’s Stop Your Crying and David Bowie’s Ashes to Ashes.

Thereafter followed several new songs, to be featured on an upcoming album which was announced in a characteristic mumble between tracks.

With a cap pulled down over his eyes, Murry cut a brooding presence.

Seemingly continuing from the geographical reference points on Murry’s breakout album The Graceless Age (2013), the singer’s new material possessed apparent icons of Americana.

At one point, he mentioned lighter fluid, his father’s Buick and the Mississippi River in one breath. The impression was summoned of a Southern Gothic story.

While Murry was settling into his set, there was discord in the crowd – a group of punters talking loudly during quiet songs were always going to cause annoyance, and some of Murry’s fans voiced their displeasure.

Again, not Murry’s fault at all, but in a small audience it was hard to ignore.

Murry performed his own rescue act with a string of songs from The Graceless Age, though, with California (about his unhappy time living in the Golden State) and The Ballad of the Pajama Kid equally stirring.

While his stripped-down approach meant some of the nuances of the album versions were lost, Murry’s mournful, sonorous vocal made up for it. His intricate finger picking also helped to fill the void of a larger set-up.

The highlight of the set was the encore, Southern Sky, whose haunting chorus – ‘she knows my face, my broken body’ – left us wondering what could have been.