Michael Hann

He barely knows what he’s doing: Oliver Anthony, at the O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, reviewed

Plus: Roisin Murphy's set at Alexandra Palace was more like a DJ mix, each song sliding into the next frictionlessly

Oliver Anthony only played for half of the night. The rest of the time he read Ecclesiastes to us from his phone. Photo: Samuel Corum/Getty Images  
issue 24 February 2024

What does a chubby, bearded American feller wearing a plaid shirt and singing about his dog and truck have in common with a chic, sonically adventurous Irish art-pop star? Both, last year, were inadvertently parachuted into the battlefields of the culture wars.

Oliver Anthony recorded a song called ‘Rich Men North of Richmond’ – Virginia, not Surrey – that was picked up by MAGA-types from an obscure country music YouTube channel, became a talking point in the Republican presidential primary debates and ended up entering the Billboard Hot 100 at No.

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