Bonnie 'Prince' Billy

It looks (hopefully) like 2007 might be the year the beard makes a welcome comeback. Andrew Flintoff got started on his early – perhaps fuelled by jealousy of Monty Panesar – and the beard count is certainly high tonight. Will Oldham's fans have obviously honed in on their idol’s penchant for fantastic facial hair, the ratio of beards must be about 1:4 among the chaps in the crowd tonight.

Will's beard is in tremendous form at the moment, jutting out at two tremendous points so that when the Kentuckian sings his mouth seems tiny in comparison to the rest of his face. It's quite a sight and brings a little warmth to Colston Hall, which is freezing tonight. Maybe Oldham brought the cold weather with him from Iceland, where he recorded last year's awe-inducing The Letting Go.

The beard itself would normally be enough to make the show but these fans have grown their facial hair for a reason - Bonnie 'Prince' Billy looks cool. When Oldham takes the stage dressed in a sharp grey suit there's a strange mixture of cheers and hushed reverie. Someone shouts out a muffled request and the singer makes a mock-confused face as he tries to work out what the guy is shouting at him. “Profiteroles?” he asks confusedly. You gotta like him.

Tonight's band comprises of Oldham, keyboardist Azita Youssefi, Aram Stith on bass, drummer Alex Nielsen and guitarist Emmett Kelly. It’s a great dynamic. Will is obviously the ringleader but his band is happy to mimic him as he chats to the audience. At one point Youssefi even provides a lip-synch for Oldham - “I'm Bonnie 'Prince' Billy and here's my life”.

Some songs charm tonight: 1998's 'No Such As What I Want', despite being a coldly brutal lyrically, is delivered tenderly as Oldham strums gently on his Gibson SG. Anything Angus Young can do, Will can do, er, quieter.

After this, Oldham gleefully explains that the title for Palace Music's 'You Have Cum In Your Hair And Your Dick Is Hanging Out' (from 1996's Arise, Therefore) is inspired by an old friend called Brian who once told him a joke about a pianist who went to practise with some fellow musicians. The pianist being particularly dishevelled, the other guys in the band say to her: “Do you know you've got cum in your hair and your dick is hanging out?” The pianist says, “No, but give me a few bars and I'll pick it up.” Ho, ho.

It's odd, but great, that while the gaps between songs are sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, as soon as the first note of any song is kicked into life the band members become extremely serious. Perhaps a throw to Oldham's time on film sets, from reality to 'reality' in the blink of an eye. Though things seems to peter out slightly in the middle of the set it's hard to keep your eyes off Oldham. Well, more specifically, his feet: he points and swings them around himself as if wielding a crutch.

Before Dawn McCarthy arrives on stage to join the rest of the band, Oldham declares that_ “it's time to get some girls on the stage. There are only two girls up here now and one of them has a beard”. McCarthy is brought on to perform on tracks from _The Letting Go. The two go together beautifully as McCarthy’s soprano skates freely over Oldham’s low-pitched growl. Oldham's electric arrangement, however gentle, fails to reflect the beauty of the record though, something which McCarthy got spot on when she opened the night armed with only a six sting, a stomping foot and a haunting soprano. 'Love Comes to Me', so tender that it's blue on record, is turned into a country waltz and others, such as 'Wai' and 'Strange Form of Life', are brought up into the beat to their detriment. It's still lovely, mind.

After an hour and a half Will returns to the stage for an encore that includes a cover of John Martyn’s 'John The Baptist'. He never quite stuns, but for an evening's entertainment one could do worse than spend a few hours in the company of Bonnie 'Prince' Billy.