Live Review: James Bay - O2 Brixton Academy, London 02/12/2022
James Bay brings the warmth back to London at a sold-out performance at the O2 Academy Brixton for the penultimate show on his Leap tour.
One of the best singer/songwriter acts to come out of the UK, we’re thrilled to welcome James Bay back. Our recent review of his show at the O2 Forum Kentish Town tells of his burst onto the scene in 2014, debut album Chaos and the Calm reaching number one, and James’s “cheerful hunky guy” description. Tonight he returns as his cheeky chappy self once again.
It’s freezing cold outside tonight in Brixton but inside, a wholesome atmosphere is present throughout the build-up to the show with support act Kevin Garrett providing some covers for us to sing along to, perpetuated by a fitting choice of Fleetwood Mac’s back catalogue during James Bay’s sound check. It’s hard to describe the crowd at a James Bay concert – they’re all varied in age and style but everybody here seems like lovely people. The Brixton Academy have concert hosting down to a fine art and although strict with ticketing areas, the staff regularly have queues handled like no other.
James Bay comes out with his band, his hat and a Nashville vibe. More than once tonight I have been reminded of Bradley Cooper’s A Star Is Born entrance with bright white lights, wailing guitars and of course, a felt hat. The latest album Leap was recorded in 2020 just before the pandemic in Nashville itself, and the influences come through in this performance. Unlike A Star Is Born rockstars though, Bay is inviting and friendly, talking to us constantly throughout the show and encouraging us to sing along from the get go with opener ‘Best Fake Smile’. As always, he brings along several guitars and switches through them to bring his signature acoustic style and belting voice for all songs.
After another energetic performance for ‘Endless Summer Nights’, James introduces himself. The homecoming return element of a gig always makes you feel special, like a family member coming back from a trip away, and James telling us it means the world that we’re here makes us feel fuzzy with appreciation. He is excited to share the new album, Leap (released 8th July), and announces he’s going to play album tracks “like tracks 7, 8 and 9” and old stuff. He wants us to cheer louder and we do. His voice is perfectly microphoned, with excellent audio and lighting even from the back of the upper circle. He ends the song with us singing the final verse again, just us and him, before he throws his plectrum into the crowd.
A singer/songwriter reaching several albums into their career must face the challenge of how to vary their sound, especially with such a strong opening onto the music scene, but James’s albums and songs feature subtle changes. On the rockier side we have some big drums and guitar moments in ‘If You Ever Want To Be In Love’, a little guitar solo in ‘Wild Love’ (we’ve previously noted the R&B grooves in our Kentish Town review). He checks in again to confirm we all feel the “Friday Night Vibes”, then proceeds to sound the most British he’s sounded whilst singing during his performance of ‘Peer Pressure’, with an Ed Sheeran playfulness which just reminds us that he’s one of us and we should be proud of our home boy.
James keeps the crowd entertained, eliciting a huge cheer after “I think you might be gettin’ louder!” sets us up for ‘Let It Go’. Despite the rules, everyone up in the circle is standing. Everybody has their arms around each other and everyone knows all the words (until an awkward moment in verse two when the entirety of O2 Brixton gets it wrong). James says nothing about this but casually throws at the end of his introduction to his next song: “if you don’t know all the words, sing along anyway with whatever you want, you all sound incredible”. He jokes about his sad song catalogue and how he writes from what he knows, but the crowd already know the words to this new song ‘One Life’ because it has so much emotion.
Following James’s sad song admission, he then respectfully removes his hat for a cover of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Songbird’ in a tribute to Christine McVie’s passing on Monday. It’s sad and sweet and familiar. Familiarity is important at this gig, with James talking to us like old friends constantly throughout the show and the songs we know by heart. Amongst the setlist is ‘Need The Sun To Break’ from his first EP, about which he jokes “I think I put out in about 1935. As ever, sing it loud if you know it”.
The real treat for any soul fans comes towards the end of the show when Kevin Garrett comes back onstage to duet with James, with some Motown beats and harmonies. ‘When We Were On Fire’ features James coming out before the microphone to sing closer to us and do his thing on the guitar; both this and the following song ‘Pink Lemonade’ have some beautiful guitar work. He tells us before ‘Craving’ that he wants to see us move, as if we haven’t been moving for the last 3 songs because we’re ending on high energy. What might be perceived as “a guy in a hat playing the guitar” is in fact a real fun show that went very quickly.
The encore is to be expected - fan favourites ‘Scars’ and ‘Hold Back The River’ have us ending at our warmest and loudest, and James sings from the heart back in his hat. We enjoyed the songs we didn’t know well before the show, and we come away wondering how we managed to pick up some biographical information about James (he talks a LOT). James, come back home to us in your hat again soon!
Words by Jemma Sharpe
Photography by Abigail Shii
