Shot! Sam Fender live in Brighton
This year’s BRITs Critics Choice winner bossed it in Brighton with a belter of a show
This was my first time seeing Sam Fender, the recipient of the 2019 BRIT Awards Critics Choice (previously won by Adele and Sam Smith) The 25-year-old Geordie has been one to watch ever since he released his first music last year, winning critical acclaim and performing around the world.
Last month, his debut album Hypersonic Missiles saw him top the UK charts and an arena tour has already been announced for early next year.
Some have already dubbed him the British Bruce Springsteen. Not only is he a big fan of the Boss, but he’s covered no less than three Springsteen songs including playing Dancing in the Dark as his encore. What’s more, his live band features a honking saxophonist just like Clarence Clemons.
Fender himself is self-deprecating, admitting he’s like “a crap version of Bruce” and that he’ll never be “as good as Springsteen” who he says is his biggest hero.
If anything, you could say he’s currently a Bruce lite, his lyrics and storytelling aren’t up there quite yet, although like Springsteen did with The Streets of Philadelphia where he highlighted the misery of HIV, Fender also writes about difficult subjects many would avoid. In his case, he explores contemporary topics such as male suicide, domestic violence, white privilege, zero hour contracts and even Russian nuclear weapons.
Like the man from New Jersey, the lad from Newcastle clearly has something to say, but this self-proclaimed “white boy with a guitar” is also keen not to be over-hyped.
Given all that, there was plenty of expectation in the air when he made his “first proper” Brighton performance at the Dome, the city’s second-biggest venue. The show was sold-out and the young crowd were clearly looking forward to seeing one of their newest idols.
He took the stage wearing blue jeans, a plain white T and trainers. Behind him, a five-piece band featured sax player Johnny ‘Bluehat’ Davies sporting a Newcastle jersey.
Optically, the most interesting thing were some of the comic book visuals which appeared on the three otherwise underused vertical screens.
Sonically there were no complaints, with shout outs in order for the sax solos as well as Drew Michael’s huge drum sound.
Fender himself proved to be a competent guitarist — naturally his guitar of choice is a Fender. Although suffering from ’the sniffles’ he did a fine job of hiding whatever discomfort he was in.
Standout songs for me included Dead Boys and Leave Fast, but it was the uptempo, anthemic tunes like the Springsteen-esque Hypersonic Missiles and Fender’s own personal favourite, The Borders, not forgetting his new single Saturday that really got the crowd going and showed despite just an album’s worth of material, Sam Fender has more than enough talent to become an important artist in the years to come.
Whilst this didn’t reach the heights of the ‘mind-blowing’ gig some claimed it to be on social media, it was a great advert for a fresh-faced musician who is definitely on the right trajectory and staking a genuine claim to be Britain’s next big thing.
Setlist: Will We Talk?| Millennial | Start Again | Greasy Spoon | All Is On My Side | The Borders | Dead Boys | Spice | Play God | Hypersonic Missiles | White Privelige | Leave Fast | Saturday | That Sound || Dancing In The Dark
“To me, shooting live music is all about capturing the personality of the performer and the emotion of their performance. And then creating an iconic image.”
Behind the image: I was only able to shoot the first three songs from the pit. As always, my focus was on taking tight portraits, rather than wide stage shots. All these images were taken with the OM-D E-M1 and the 75mm 1.8 lens using the in-camera digital zoom and available light only. Shot in Brighton on 30 November 2019.
