Live Review:

Fionn Regan (support: Francis Leftwich, Danny and the Champions of the World)
Fibbers, York
14/02/2010


A gig by sweethearts' favourite Fionn Regan is perhaps not the best place to spend a lonely Valentines day. Still, it's not every week that someone you've heard of plays York, so in the interests of music journalism your intrepid ((URY)) reporter did her best to blank out the couples eating each others faces to check out this rare event.

The first support is local Yorkshire lad Benjamin Francis Leftwich, who we're pleased to report was really rather good. A veritable embryo of nineteen tender years, Leftwich performs the impressive feat of commanding the attention of a packed Fibbers with his thoughtful folky tunes. We suspect he's one to watch.

Danny and the Champions of the World is one of the best band names we've ever heard, so it was a huge disappointment when their singer strode on wearing a trilby, popularly understood in sartorial semiotics as the universal sign of a class A twat (see also: Kaiser Chiefs). Predictable hooks degenerated into ten-minute country jam yawnfests about mountains and sheep or something, whilst the singer performed a series of facial contortions that we think were meant to show that he was a Serious Musician but in fact gave the more apt impression that he was extruding an especially satisfying turd.

A sense of relief descended when the lovely Mr Regan toddled onstage, sporting an oversized train drivers' hat which he removed to reveal an experimental bowl cut style last seen on scabby-kneed ten year olds in school playgrounds around 1970. It was excellent and we're already placing bets on it becoming the next Hot Indie Look. Regan's set is drawn mostly from his new album, Shadow of an Empire, which we're still rather wary of. The lyrics are flawless, as poetic and perceptive as we've come to expect from this former Mercury winner, but by treading the path towards a poppier, country aesthetic as fellow indie darlings Conor Oberst and Ben Kweller have done, Regan loses the understated charm and intimacy of his earlier records. Still, props to him for not producing an exact copy of his first record and maybe we just need to give it a few more listens. Tonight's spine-tingling performance of new track Violent Demeanour certainly suggests there's more to the new material than first meets the ear.

By Hannah Boast