Originally from Cornwall, songwriter and producer Benjamin Woods founded The Golden Dregs and quickly released two albums – Lafayette (2018) and Hope Is For The Hopeless (2019)— before signing to 4AD for 2023’s On Grace & Dignity and forming his own Joy of Life label for 2025’s more expansive Godspeed. Each highlighted Woods’ love of narrative songwriting, influenced by the likes of Raymond Carver, and delivered in his rich baritone, often compared to the likes of Leonard Cohen and David Bergman. Woods’ music blends stinging wit with “existential dread and reckless abandon”, according to Woods himself.
Oxford’s Jericho Tavern is a great venue, with intimate acoustics, which are well-suited for the six-piece Dregs band whose performance is less about spectacle and more about depth, with a slow-burning resonance. Despite a disappointingly small audience, the band appeared to thrive, unfolding their stories with an assured confidence that comes from a collective rather than from just the singer.
They open with ‘American Airlines’, a gentle mix of baritone murmurs, soft synth hums, and brushed percussion before diving into the new album with ‘Linoleum’ and a melancholic ‘Company of Strangers’. These set the tone for an emotive and unhurried set. The crowd responded in kind: hushed and attentive. Much of the new album was performed with arrangements, at times, seeming to blend folk, chamber rock and subtle psychedelia.
Woods’ vocals were supported by Issie Armstrong’s at different points of the show, which brought a pleasant warmth to his baritone whilst the band supported with their soft guitar spirals, warm bass glides, the melodies often led by keyboard and piano and minimal, yet expressive, drumming all coming together to offer an atmosphere closer to a shared late-night confession than a conventional indie set. Woods’ dry, understated humour between songs punctured the stillness just enough to allow the audience a slight opening into his world.
By the time they closed with ‘The Wave’, its harmonies rising like a soft tide, the room felt hushed. Nothing felt rushed; nothing felt overstated. This was a performance rooted in trust — trust in the songs, in the space, and in an audience willing to meet them halfway.
