Date/Time Sun 26 Mar 2017 7:45 PM

Price Online - £10 + £1 booking fee; On The Door - £10

Website: http://www.worrydollsmusic.com/

Worry Dolls are a duo born out of the joint talents of Zoe Nicol and Rosie Jones, who met in Liverpool when they were 18, both on their chosen path of becoming solo singer songwriters, and both falling under the spell of ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou?’. They set off together making music as Worry Dolls, blending the tender urgency of Zoe’s Irish-influenced voice with the fiery integrity of Rosie’s vocals and rhythmic guitar. Zoe transferred her finger-picking skills to ukulele, followed by Earl Scruggs-style banjo, motivated by players like Emily Robison (Dixie Chicks) and Winston Marshall (Mumford & Sons).

Rosie grew up singing and playing a variety of instruments in a music-filled household in Devon, picking up guitar after finding an old nylon-string under the stairs. A huge turning point came at 13 after hearing Michelle Branch whilst watching an episode of Buffy, who then became her musical muse. As a teenager, Rosie’s musical diet was a mix of punk bands & angsty singer songwriters, finding country through a friend’s copy of Ryan Adams’ ‘Heartbreaker’. Inspired by the shared DIY ethos of both punk & country, she started playing the harmonica and writing country songs, born from boredom in her Devonshire heavenly country existence. At 17, she wrote a song called Tennessee about wanting to live in Nashville and get her heart broken so that she could write songs like the ones she loved.

Zoe, whose family originate from Liverpool and Ireland, was raised in a small village in Kent by her mum. She inheriting music from her parents who, although separated, were both performers which resulted in a childhood spent back and forth between her mum’s theatrical rehearsals and her dad’s club gigs. Discovering her own voice at 7, she went on to channel her ideas into poems and a’cappella songs, as well as starring as the lead villain in school productions. At 12, she started learning to play her dad’s old Spanish guitar to accompany herself, drawing inspiration from Eva Cassidy and Joni Mitchell; the songs poured out.

The pair move down to London and visited Nashville, where they worked with TwickFolk friends The Wild Ponies, and recorded their début album, produced by Neilson Hubbard. The results will be available in 2017.

The top video is the first single from the new album, courtesy of Under The Apple Tree. Below is a track from the 2015 ‘Burden’ EP