Well, I’m off on another adventure. I got up at 6.20am last Thursday morning to get a lift to the train station to get a train to Dublin, to get a bus to the airport to get a plane to Biarritz to get a taxi to the train station to get a train to Bordeaux to jump in a car and get whisked off to a gig I knew nothing about in the ‘Rock School Barbey‘.

The line up was three French female artists, opening with Oshen. The crowd were getting impatient by the time we rushed in late, munching our tasty tortilla chips for dinner, but they must have been waiting for us to arrive, because shortly after we found a good vantage point the gig got underway.

Oshen arrived on with a guitar, a drummer,a lead guitar player and a keyboard player, and launched into a fairly bog standard singer songwriter number. At least i assume it was - I don’t speak a word of French but it sounded like one. Hey, maybe the lyrics were amazing, but they’d have had to be to save this mediocre melody. You could tell she had a good voice, and you could tell she wasn’t using it.

I began to steel myself for a long night standing after a long days travelling.

But Oshen’s opening was obviously a clever prank, designed to highlight the brilliance that followed as over the next couple of songs she transformed into an incredible performer, who knew well how to use those vocal chords to full effect.

I became increasingly engaged as Oshen’s show went from standard fare to unique cabaret - bear my lack of French in mind and marvel at her ability to give me a good idea of the theme of each song with her full characterisations of the characters in her songs.

She was humourous in her approach, and if you spoke French, she was hilarious in the preambles to her songs judging by the audience. Oshen’s set went from strength to strength, maintaining a wonderful balance between humour and soul, cabaret and cool.

Some interesting interludes in the set included, as one of her encores, a great cover of George Michael’s ‘Faith and (as only a French performer could get away with) a When-Harry-Met-Sallyesque glimpse into an intimate encounter more humourous than the one Sally gave, and without being at all cringeful.

You don’t need French to enjoy this wonderful performer, someone should get her over to ireland to play. She’d go down a bomb at Electric Picnic I’d say.

Right now,amazon.co.uk only has her old album , but maybe they’ll get her new one soon.