-  Do you know Lehmann B Smith? He doesn’t tend to promote his own stuff very much. It might be a bit exhausting since the volume of it seems to be increasing? Becoming vast? You’re more likely to have heard of him when he’s working with others, like that charming collaboration with Lucy Roleff or a few years ago the supergroup that was Totally Mild before its sadly awkward, uncomfortable and untimely demise. Left to other people, they obviously choose to draw attention to his remarkable skills as a singer songwriter and his easy command of a hundred years worth of popular musical styles. Left to himself he just makes more and more music to surprise and delight when it coalesces in my inbox, out of the dark ether of the internet.

I feel a bit guilty, actually, there’s so much of Smith’s stuff and I feel like I should cover it all - and I certainly fail at that. I think he may even have, most unusually, reached out with his last solo record and sent it to me personally for review and I, having let my inbox runneth over, missed it until it was too late - sorry Lehmann! Fortunately I’ve got here in time to make mention of his latest, though it be One Night Only.

I still feel a little bit nervous because I know vanishingly little about it. It’s styled as a live recording -and I think it actually is- but unlike most live recordings it’s not a rendition of a recent studio album, but appears to be a selection of material previously unheard. I tried to recall having heard these songs and then paged through Lehmann’s extensive back-catalogue but couldn’t find this stuff anywhere - really hope I’m right about that one! Recorded at The Aviary, Abbotsford complete with slightly off-kilter, gently humorous and finally, just warmly appreciative crowd interaction; it’s nice to see there are a bunch of folks out there who seem to appreciate Lehmann as much as I do.

Getting into the songs, The Someone is from the less misanthropic end of the Smith songbook, celebrating folks who are a bit different as Lehmann proclaims “I bet you’re the someone I’m gonna love.” The big bursts of instrumentalism between the slow-dance six-eight of the verses makes me think of the very accomplished Americana of bands like, er, The Band. So, right in the center of Smith’s appreciation for mid-century rock.

There’s a ton of good stuff in here: lightly fusion rock with all the subtle nuance I’ve come to expect. Some bits are the more misanthropic Lehmann I’m very well acquainted with, like this snippet from Crying: “I’m crying over you / Our life is over and it ain’t so bad / But if you turn out the best that I’ll ever have / Then I’ll be crying over you, baby.” Lehmann’s light but surprisingly high warble often soars out over the top of his versatile band.

Speaking of that misanthropy, we get some hilarious nihilism in the unintentional intro to What Is Even The Point, a separate track called False Start where Lehmann wheezes out the titular lyrics "What is even the point?" and just collapses into laughter, several times, until the band give up and start playing an instrumental of Groove Is In The Heart - love it.

This is another great, Lehmann B Smith album and the bold gambit to record the whole thing live has paid off handsomely. I’m gonna go out (not very far) on a limb to say that one of the quietly best folks to have behind the boards, Nick Huggins, who did the mastering here, has something to do with that, though I should compliment recorder Gareth Parton and Smith who did his own mixing for the crystal clear production sound, too. I’ve said before, I never expect to see Lehmann B Smith storming up a chart -sorry, mate!- but if you fancy a musician’s musician then this is your guy, performing here at the peak of his powers, for One Night Only.

- Chris Cobcroft.