Jamie T - HiFi

Somewhere along the way in the past few years of his rapid rise, Jamie T has transformed from a charming cheeky London chappy playing anywhere that would take him with only his trusty acoustic bass as company into a cockier (but still fairly charming) world travelling, eternally casual superstar. His past awkward and apologetic inter song banter replaced with the trusty How are you doing insert town name? and I’m going to need help on the next one, you guys ready?.His wordy chatty, monologue, cockney, dylanesque songs are now packed out by a full and loud band that look like they were found ablimg South London streets, the key and complex lyrics sometimes getting somewhat lost in the noise. His newer material which is less original but more suited to a band follows a current trend in British music, attempting to make every song a jagged youth anthem.

What turned this eccentric, gnarly looking, shy super-busker (for want of a better phrase) into such an international star? Whatever it was has pretty much the entire crowd in the palm of his hands, not singing, but shouting extremely loudly along with every word of every song, even the ‘new’ ones, actually drowning the sound from the stage at some points. Most of the crowd are surprised with their own reaction and with each other, and most of the band are equally as surprised with the reaction they are receiving, that even on the other side of the world from sunny Wimbledon the songs hit home so much into such a varied crowd, in age, culture and creed.For a two night sold out headline show, Jamie plays a short 45 minute set, perhaps the sign of an artist exposed to stardom slightly too soon, on the plus side it means everyone gets to hear all the songs they wanted to and go home with no regrets and nothing lacking from a night of screeching ecstatically at full volume.

Published in Inpress