Delilah gig review, HMV Institute, Birmingham 18.04.12

Amy Winehouse meets Adele

It's been a busy week - 3 gigs in 3 days (and now a crippled back from standing) but some great music along the way! 

First up is Delilah; if you're new to her then congratulations! You are just about to discover one of the best up and coming British artists out here right now. Born in Paris, raised in London and heritage from many different nationalities, her music fuses all of these cultures together.

HMV Institute, Birmingham

The gig kicked off with support act Josh Kumra - perfect choice of support. He came on performing the original version of Don't Go which you will know better as the single Wretch 32 re-worked, resulting in a number 1 for the two of them last year. The acoustic is beautiful; I made a clip of the performance which you can view here. 

Delilah later enters the stage dressed down but delivering a vocal performance of the highest class. Song after song she hit every note to the delight of an extremely receptive crowd, to which she smiled shyly as if almost surprised by her own talent. 

One song in particular that impressed me was Cinnababy. She stated it was a song she had written at the age of 14 after an argument between her and her mum who was eating a cinnamon pastry at the time and shouting at her in-between mouthfuls it strangely inspired her to write this beautiful song! Just her and a few piano chords (which she plays herself) showed off the wonderful quality to her dreamy vocals which you can get a listen of here.

As the show continued I found myself seeing flickers of Amy Winehouse in her; admittedly her appearance is slightly reminiscent of Amy i.e. the tattoo's on her arm, dark features etc and then at times I heard snippets of her vocals being similar to that of Adele, but then she would break off into her own shivery hues which define her from any other artist out there. 

She went on to sing her latest single Breathe after Inside Your Love and Love You So and finished with an encore performance of Go. The last note of her voice lingered on the air leaving everybody humming the "oooh's" of Go as we entered the street. 

So all in all an absolutely fantastic gig, and I feel it's safe to say everyone that attended left feeling extremely excited for her album From The Roots Up due for release some time this summer. She is an absolute credit to the British music scene, I look forward to seeing her perform again at BBC Radio 1xtra's Hackney Weekend!

Check out the footage for Love You So below.