Friday 13/03/09 Emiliana Torrini @ ULU, London

Emiliana Torrini is no shrinking violet. The Icelandic-Italian musician effortlessly engages her audience with her offbeat humour and an easygoing, natural energy and seems not to care less whether her ideas and her music will please us. Luckily they do please Gigwise, very much.

Following the country-based, sincere Island Lines, Emiliana bounds into view, in colourful dress and colourful mood. Somewhere between Bjork and Martha Wainwright, her vocals soar gracefully over the sound of her big-haired band and her songs are broken up with entertaining explanations of how particular ones came about. The charming Icelandic lilt to her accent adds intrigue to her lyrics and we learn that the friend for whom she wrote a song was the only friend who failed to call to ask if it was about her.

Some of her songs are serious and gentle (this is the girl who sang the eerie Gollum Song on Lord of the Rings), while others (Jungle Drum) are unashamedly upbeat and catchy and make the sleepy, too-restrained audience looks as though it would consider shaking its hips and getting down to the beat if it didn’t consist predominantly of coolly self-conscious art student types. The contrary, wistful Sunnyroad could compete with any folk legend’s repertoire, while Big Jumps is a truly original love ditty with some clever lyrics. Gun is an eerie, guitar-heavy song of lament for an adolescent gone off the tracks. The delicious Heartstopper single quite literally does what it says on the tin, stealing our collective breath away in the process.