George Ezra, O2 Academy, Birmingham - review
With a voice that is instantly recognisable, George Ezra had fans hanging from his every - very deep - word.
The 24-year-old singer/songwriter kicked off his performance with Cassy O’ last night and the sold out crowd at Birmingham’s O2 Academy sang along to every word.
Considering George has only been on the music scene for the last few years it was surprising to see a real mix of fans from young teenagers to people old enough to be his grandparents.
But it was just that kind of music; accessible to everyone and easy listening. And even if the fans didn’t know the words it was simple to catch up quickly.
George played a mix of his older songs from 2014’s Wanted on Voyage and his newest album, Staying at Tamara’s, released two weeks ago.
As well as performing a number of his hits while playing the guitar, he also was a pretty good storyteller.
In between every couple of numbers he stopped to tell the audience little anecdotes about how he writes songs, where different lyrics and music came from and snippets of information about his life in recent years.
For example, his latest album is called Staying at Tamara’s because George decided to head to a city for a month to write some of his music. He chose Barcelona; and instead of finding a hotel, found a spare room in a woman’s house on the internet and arranged with his management to stay there for the duration.
Rather than this being a terrible mistake, the house was full with Tamara’s creative friends - and that decision can be thanked for his latest album.
George also told the audience how the tune for one song popped into his head when he was in the tour bus on the West Coast of America.
He said he shared the bus with 11 others and, as they were in a confined space, each of them took it in turns to be ill. One day it was his turn and he was feeling sorry for himself when a tune popped into his head, so he quickly recorded it on his phone - and forgot about it for almost a year. That song was Paradise.
From his slower songs to his more upbeat numbers, there was a wide variety, which ended with an encore of the song Budapest.
Some artists don’t sound as good live as they do on their records, some are about the same, but I’d go as far as to say George was even better.
