Northampton’s keyboard wizard Greg Coulson put on a spectacular show for his album launch for his ‘Live at Peggy’s Skylight’ album at The Charles Bradlaugh in Northampton.
Greg is much in demand outside his own band and had played five dates in February 2026 in Australia (including Perth & Sydney) with the band Moorcheeba, as well as guesting for Alice Armstrong and her band at Milkfest 2026 in London. He also performs with Will Wilde, The Blockheads and Spiritualise.
His expert keyboard playing got the attention of the UK Blues Federation members as he has been nominated for the 2026 Blues Instrumentalist of the Year award and is in the final five. The award winner will be announced at the UK Blues Federation awards in The Stables, Milton Keynes in April 2026.
Greg had invited two local support acts to support him at the packed gig on the dedicated music stage with firstly Billy Lockett and then Thea Watson.
Billy Lockett is a Northampton born performer and entertained us on guitar, keyboards, harmonica and his excellent vocals. He was grateful to Greg to allow him to perform his short set before going on his own tour dates and his set included several new songs. This included ‘The Funeral’ which was about his ex-girlfriends with great guitar picking and powerful vocals.
The next song was about his Dad who supported him at the beginning of his career with ‘Things Are Looking Up’ on guitar and harmonica with passionate vocals. The next song was much more upbeat with ‘Honey You’re my Masterplan’ with the crowd encouraged to join in. The final two songs were ‘Fading to Gray’ with its soaring vocals and ‘I Can Use a Friend’ which was a song about friendship & love and getting over drug addiction.
Next, we had Rugby’s Thea Watson and her five-piece band of Thea Watson (vocals), Greg Jacobs (drums), Alex Still (bass), Elliott Clark (guitar) & Louis van den Boogard (keys).
The set started with ‘This is a Mad World’ which was a great soulful starting number with blues guitar break from Elliott. Co-written with Greg Coulson ‘Chain Smoker’ was a slower paced funky soulful number with jazz influences and great vocals.
Then the Norah Jones song ‘Don’t Know Why’ had a mellow feel, lovely guitar picking and soulful vocals. Another song co-written with Greg, about women facing challenges in music industry was ‘Man Child’. As Thea said a fun song with great blues guitar break and quick heavy rhythm.
The final song was ‘Skin & Tears’ about her struggles this year, a slower more mellow song with supportive keys with passionate vocals.
Then we had the headline act with Greg Coulson and his band with the line-up of Greg Coulson (keyboards & vocals), Mat Day (guitar & backing vocals), John Thompson (bass) & Sam Round (drums).
One of the USP’s of this band is the close working interplay between Greg on expressive keyboards and Mat on blues guitar. They have been working together since 2018 and it shows in the brilliant performance. They are backed by a great rhythm section of John on bass and Sam on drums.
The set included the songs from the new album interspersed with a couple of new songs. He kicked off with 'Philly Blues' before the classic ‘Stitch Me Up’ with its blues and jazz influenced vocals and keyboards and then the guitar & keyboards interplay of ‘Someone To Be There’ with Greg’s great evocative vocals.
Then a song about a bad trip in Portland, Oregon with a heavy beat and great blues/jazz vocals and great blues guitar from Mat.
Next, we had a new song, though written a couple of years ago with ‘Abigail’ before we moved to a slower tempo to start on ‘Why Don’t You Do Right’ with Greg’s intro section with lovely guitar accompaniment, which goes well with Mat’s solo break backed by drums & bass, then joined again by Greg to a powerful ending.
Then another new song with ‘The Wheel’ which was a raunchy upbeat number with great keys/guitar interplay in blues/jazz style. Followed by a funky keyboard intro to ‘Sick Note’ with its great story telling vocals and keys & guitar.
The set finished with ‘Introverted Blues’ which is a slower tempo slinky blues/jazz number, the partially written 'Birds of a Feather', Will Wilde’s ‘Thirty Eight’ which is a song about being in love with an older woman and ‘Girls’.
After a standing ovation the band came back with a song from a key influence to Greg with the Steely Dan number ‘Kid Charlemagne’ with its great keyboards/vocals and guitar break from Mat.