On Wednesday 4th October, singer songwriter Lucy Spraggan brought her current acoustic tour to the intimate surroundings of Brudenell Social Club in Leeds. Lucy released her latest album ‘I Hope You Don’t Mind Me Writing’ back in January and saw it enter the iTunes album chart at #12. Since its release, Lucy has been busy touring the album and recently embarked on her first headline tour in Europe.
Joined onstage by keyboardist Richard Littlewood, Lucy had the crowd in the palm of her hand from the first song; the mellow and reflective ‘I Don’t Live There Anymore’ from ‘I Hope You Don’t Me Writing’. With a huge smile plastered across her face, Lucy finished the track and expressed her excitement to be playing in Leeds again. Some artists play track after track with no crowd interaction but that’s far from Lucy’s style and she introduced each track with a little anecdote.
It was clear to see Lucy’s love of intimate venues that allow her the chance to communicate with her audience as she wittily replied to hecklers throughout the night and gave fans the opportunity to choose a couple of tracks on the set list. Whilst introducing ‘Mountains’ from her album ‘Join The Club’, Lucy explained how it was written about a time that she met an old lady in a train station, receiving a collective “aw” from the audience and responding with “what’s so sad about that?” Lucy’s lovable personality is one of the traits that sets her aside from a lot of artists and combined with her humour, she made everybody feel as though they were at a private gig that she was hosting in her local pub.
Jokingly introducing ‘Last Night (Beer Fear)’ as a serious song, before strumming those chords that everybody is more than familiar with, Lucy had the whole place dancing (and reminiscing about their alcohol laced nights of the past!) As well as being relatable, Lucy’s lyrics are incredibly meaningful and three of the most emotively performed tracks were ‘Fight For It’, ‘Dear You’ and ‘All That I’ve Loved (For Barbara)’ – the latter having been written about Lucy’s wife Georgina’s Grandma, who suffered with dementia. ‘Fight For It’ and the heartbreaking ‘Dear You’ are on Lucy’s latest album and both take a moving look at the issues of mental health problems and suicide.
The majority of Lucy’s set list was comprised of tracks from ‘Join The Club’ and ‘I Hope You Don’t Mind Me Writing’, though she’s been writing again (we still don’t mind) and played two new tracks that will hopefully be on her fifth album; a feel good track titled ‘The Sunday Song’ about everyone’s favourite day of the week (don’t even dare disagree) and ‘Home Wasn’t Built In A Day’. Written about “when you move house with somebody that you love and forget that you love them”, ‘Home Wasn’t Built In A Day’ showcased one of Lucy’s strongest vocal performances of the night and a crowd sing-along that would lead you to believe that it had been released years ago.
The show came to an end with the empowering ‘Unsinkable’; the only track to be played from the 2015 released ‘We Are’ – the chorus transformed the crowd into a choir, with everybody in the room throwing their arms in the air in unison upon the final “Unsinkable” of each chorus. Lucy and Rich were off stage for just seconds before they returned for the anthemic ‘Wait For Me’ – being modest, Lucy taught the lively crowd the chorus and asked them to sing along, though they sang more than that what they were taught, with Lucy joking that they weren’t to sing her bit.
When you go to a Lucy Spraggan show, it not your average show, you get the full Spraggan experience; songs, stories, laughs and tears. Lucy’s on tour for the rest of the month – don’t miss out on the chance to see her in an intimate venue!
