Margaret Glaspy

Margaret Glaspy plays The Kitchen Garden on Thursday 22 October, presented by Kitchen Garden. It's a headline show, so it's just her on the bill.

Glaspy is a Californian singer and songwriter from Red Bluff, in Northern California, and she's been writing songs since she was 15. Her musical background is an odd mix: competitive fiddle and marching-band trombone, with influences that run from Joni Mitchell to Elliott Smith. She started out with the self-released Homeschool EP in July 2012, signed to ATO Records in 2015 and put out her debut album Emotions and Math shortly after. From there it's been a steady run of records: Devotion in March 2020, then Echo the Diamond in 2023, which Uncut described as songs that glint like shards of glass yet brim with love, grief, courage, existential doubt and all the stuff that makes us human. Her latest release is I Am Both, which pairs direct vocals with eloquent guitar work in a folk-leaning indie-rock style.

So, if you're wondering where she sits, it's that folk-leaning indie rock—direct singing and a guitar that does a fair bit of the heavy lifting. The set will likely draw from the newer material on I Am Both and Echo the Diamond, with the older records sitting behind them. It's a singer-songwriter night in the truest sense: one person, her voice, and her guitar.

The Kitchen Garden is at 17 York Road, Kings Heath, Birmingham B14 7SA. The show starts at 8:00 pm, with doors opening at 7:30 pm. The Birmingham date is sold out, so you'll need to keep an eye on the venue if you're hoping for a last-minute ticket.