The Leisure Society – St Giles, London 25/11/09

-
Photo credit: Gavin McKenzie

Tucked away round the corner from the grandiose Christmas lights of Oxford Street is the equally grandiose St-Giles-in-the-Fields. A proper, functioning church, I’m surprised I’m not handed a hymn book on my way in, and my Catholic upbringing almost causes me to genuflect at the end of the pew. Almost. But the perfect setting for what has been a whirlwind year for The Leisure Society – 2009 saw their glorious ascent from playing to less than 100 people to the odd Radio 2 session and selling out venues left, right and centre.

With the unenviable task of warming up the rather chilly church (central heating is the devil’s work, apparently), and warming up the rather bemused and amused congregation (where’s the bar? Is there a bar?) Erland and the Carnival take to the stage. Their psychedelic- like rhythms soon has the early bird audience wiggling in their seats, and it’s patently clear why Full Time Hobby have recently snapped them up. Girls and boys, old and young, this is certainly a band of contrasts and assorted sounds and influences. The lead singer looks adorably exhausted after their brief but energetic set.

So after a rather lengthy changeover (although with so many band members and one roadie, making his roadie debut, in fact), it’s fairly understandable that 30 minutes just wasn’t quite long enough, The Leisure Society wrap up 2009.

Filing in from the back of the church, the band seem to have a rather confident spring in their step. Unsurprising, really, but once on stage Nick Hemming admits they were all quaking in their boots at the prospect of tonight. It’s the first of many bouts of banter from Nick – from the touching admission that the day he left his job in a warehouse to do music full time was the same day many of his colleagues were also made redundant, to the fact that there was an AA meeting taking place in the other room and people kept wandering in to ask where the bar was (there wasn’t one, by the way). Whilst no doubt the audience would like to think this simply the band feeling comfortable with their audience, the banter breaks were in fact to fill the awkward silence caused by technical gremlins – one gremlin in particular that meant the band were unable to hear themselves in the monitors.

Whilst Nick did seem to be squirming somewhat, the audience lapped up his anecdotes and running jokes, which ultimately seemed to help the atmosphere in the somewhat un-friendly venue.

The set-list, as expected, was a blow-by-blow account of The Sleeper, and why it’s deservedly made it’s way onto many albums of the year lists. The venue seemed to thrive on The Leisure Society’s sound, sucking it up and blowing it back out twice as loud and full. The flute, violin and vocals soared to the rafters, underpinned by the subtle rhythm of guitars, keyboards and drums.

The special guests for the night – the Wilkommen Collective Singers, were a nice addition but unfortunately there weren’t enough of them to really fill the space – they needed a bit more oomph behind them to really be heard at the back of the church.

As one of the evening’s special treats, the band performed their cover of The Beatles’ ‘Something’ which they recorded for MOJO’s covers CD. As with their cover of Gary Numan’s ‘Cars’, they gave the song the full Leisure Society treatment, complete with (of course) twee ukulele, with Nick adding a certain suave panache to the vocals.

There’s also a first outing for new song ‘I Shall Forever Remain an Amateur’, which sums up perfectly what we love about Leisure Society – their wonderfully humble modesty, and unwavering dedication.

As the band leave the stage to a standing ovation, they seem genuinely delighted, and will no doubt be back to do it all again even better next year.