Alabama 3 review – raucous ravers soak up mashup outlaws' sin and soul

Jake Black, one of the founding members of Alabama 3, died in May this year. The southern-fried, dance-infused country irregulars formed in Brixton in the mid-1990s, yet Black was from Glasgow: this would have been a hometown gig.

Usually, you might say he was here in spirit. But Black, who performed as addled preacher the Very Reverend D Wayne Love, is also here in a more corporeal form, commemorated as an alabaster-white idol in a black suit, gazing out over a raucous, sold-out flock of ravers of all ages.

This cluster of pre-Christmas shows coincides with the rerelease of Alabama 3’s 1997 debut Exile on Coldharbour Lane, the album that captured their fervent mash-up of club and country in persuasive detail. Before they play the record in its entirety, the nine-piece band pay tribute to Black via a raised-fist salute to his effigy while Love Me Tender plays. Rob Spragg – AKA lead singer Larry Love – wears a black Elvis jumpsuit and matching wig. It might sound eccentric, but like Alabama 3’s music, it is both larger than life and supremely heartfelt.

Their signature hit is still Woke Up This Morning, hand-picked by Sopranos creator David Chase to soundtrack his glowering TV mob opera. But that extraordinary track – a slice of calculated menace underpinned by gospel swells, which goes down an absolute storm tonight – was only ever one facet of their sound. What has kept Alabama 3 a festival fixture for over two decades is their other assets: wicked humour, leaning hard into outlaw country tropes and finding the grooviest balance between sin and soul. All are present in Hypo Full of Love, as Black’s resurrected voice details a questionable 12-step programme that culminates in a mass singalong of the “shoot me up” chorus.

It is a cathartic but celebratory experience. The encore features a ceremonial lone piper and a climactic Too Sick to Pray that unites the entire congregation in off-kilter voice. There are apparently plans for a new Alabama 3 album next year, but tonight feels more like a rambunctious wake, one that Black – wherever he is – would have surely adored.

* At Academy, Bristol, on 20 December and Academy, Brixton, London, on 21 December.