live review
Darren Poyzer live at Haigh Hall Music Festival
Saturday 15th June 2003

"I stood next to a lad that lives down my road and I’d not known he knew who DP was. He corrected me by stating "Yeh! Who doesn’t know DP? From The Beaches Of Ibiza! I got barred from the Collective once when he played!" As the drunken fella on my right continued to tell me tales of fights in The Tavern, Poyzer played his set better than I’d ever seen him on the stage.

Darren Poyzer knows what he’s doing and you can tell this because of the way that his songs are well structured. It’s obvious that he loves what he’s doing as I found him before the gig, sitting on a bench on his own just practising a song. DP has got a set of lovely songs that are easy on the ear. "Sunday Morning Footballer" tells the tale of getting up and going to the park on those wet weekends. Every boy can relate to that and that’s his strength. He’s very much an artist for the people.

DP knows what you want to hear. It’s almost as if he knows where you have come from to get to one of his shows and this is reflected in his songs.

His stand out track is the one that makes him infamous as my drunken mate told me. "From The Beaches Of Ibiza To The Shores Of Vietnam" is Darren’s turn to talk about his life. It’s clear that his aim is not just to play a few songs and allow the crowd to be satisfied by that – no. Darren Poyzer’s aim is to influence people for the better. He cares about the environment he lives in and he tries to convince the crowd to make the world a better place by sending across his own message throughout his set.

Darren Poyzer is a powerful artist and one who certainly showed Haigh Hall how to rock an acoustic guitar."

Courtesy of Wigan Music Scene / Chris Byron