By Monique Needham

Jazz Cafe, London - 16 December 2004

From South London’s Thornton Heath to America’s Philadelphia, one side of the Atlantic to the other, who would ever have though that these two suave females would have blown up the way they have. I hear people trying claim that they know them, saying things like, ‘Yeah, that’s my friend’s sister’s boyfriend’s cousin’, trying to find any connection to them that they can. But don’t think that songtress Marsha and “Floecist” Natalie have forgotten where they really came from. They couldn’t help but big up places like Thornton Heath, Clapham Junction and Brixton, not forgetting those people from North, East and West London.

With it being only their second visit back to London’s finest Jazz Café for an entire week, from December 11th through till the 19th, Floetry had completely sold out, and believe me, those tickets went fast!

There is a price to pay if you want to be right at the front: a long and tedious wait. Doors opened at 7pm and they did not come out till 9pm, so if you want to be right next to Floetry, or any other Jazz Café act for that matter, you want to make sure you’re there from the start.

Both elegantly dressed in black trouser suits, Natalie with a white top and Marsha with pink, they slowly walked round to the stage downstairs. All the crowd could do was applaud and show nothing but love.

For the whole night they had everyone singing along to their songs and at one point, Marsha even had to just stop singing and listen. While they performed, their personalities just shone through. Natalie seems like the most talkative because out of the two of them, she was the one constantly speaking to the crowd. She told us about the things they do when they are back in Philly, and when they start missing London, they play a game called ‘What you know about…’ Here’s an example, ‘What you know about Cadburys chocolate buttons?’ or ‘what do you know about Live & Kicking?’ The purpose of the game is to go through all the things that you can only get here in England.

‘Getting Late’ had to be the most intense song of the night. It was a song that had everyone singing all the words; Marsha would sing ‘But I’m afraid’, and the crowd would reply, ‘You said don’t be’. It was such a strong performance. Scanning the room, I noticed that people had their eyes closed just swaying from side to side feeling the music. Floetry’s performance of this song was amazing, and just by looking at their facial expressions whilst they sing shows how much of a passion music is to their lives.

The most memorable song of the night had to be ‘Hey You’, their closing song, singing: ‘Hey you/ Sorry that I have to leave/ I’ll try to come back’. Then they flipped it: ‘Hey you/ Sorry that we have to leave/ We’ll try to come back’.

Finding it so difficult to pull themselves away from their loving and dedicated audience, the girls walked up those stairs and waved goodbye. But they really did come back quickly, running back down those stairs again and turning it from a concert into a house party. Natalie began reminiscing, singing songs like ‘Murder She Wrote’ by Chaka Demus and Pliers, and ‘Been Around The World’ by Lisa Stansfield. That’s when they dropped it to the crowd; they have finally finished their second album called ‘Flology’, which is due to hit stores by March 2005. Even though they had finished it, someone had called them up requesting to work with them. Trying to make us figure out who the person was, Natalie told everyone to sing along to the next song. What did they play? ‘Purple Rain’. Yep, that’s right, the one and only Price will be featuring on the new Floetry album. A wonderful surprise to an already great evening.

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