OPENING for one of the biggest females in the music industry is no easy task and before watching them do it, I don’t know if I could have named someone to do it.

Florence and the Machine played the Genting Arena (formally the LG Arena), in Birmingham, on September 19, and had the three-piece The Staves warm up the stage for her.

The sisters took to the stage and stood in a semi-circle in front of their small band. They were quiet and slightly awkward.

I had listened to their 2014 album If I Was before coming to the show and thought the music felt a little empty. However, powering through speakers and echoing round a room filled with thousands of people I was hit, hard.

After the first two tracks, Wisely and Slow and Black and White, I was the converted.

The multi-instrumentalists continually swapped instruments, swapped lead vocals, harmony lines, and so on, that I could not keep track of who was leading who, and that is something that only people who are totally connected can pull off.

Each harmony shut conversations person were having in the first half of the standing crowd, and there were people surrounding me in the seated area that literally lost their words (some didn’t as they were singing along).

I, personally, had a tear brought to my eye on more than one occasion.

If you listen to The Staves on digital on CD, you may regret it. But, if you find yourself with a chance to see them live, do it. You will appreciate every note and every word sung by those three women who are surely to bring acoustic folk rock into the mainstream chart.

The Staves will be embarking on their own headline tour at the end of October/the start of November, with a show at Birmingham’s Institute on November 1. For tickets, visit ticketmaster.co.uk/The-Staves-tickets/artist/1612718.