Lucy Rose, Union Chapel, review: a modest performance from Bombay Bicycle Club’s former backup singer
Even if you haven’t heard of Lucy Rose, her breathy, lilting vocals may ring a bell.
Now 30 years old, she was originally a backup singer for the indie group Bombay Bicycle Club: Rose’s voice was the pleasant coo behind Jack Steadman’s warble.
She went solo in 2012, developing a modish style somewhere between glitter and gloom. Her songs were used in television shows such as Girls, Skins and The Vampire Diaries. But, performing at the Union Chapel in London on Tuesday night, Rose’s stark and stirring music stretched well beyond the realms of a teen drama soundtrack.
Performing songs from her new album, No Words Left, Rose drew on jazz riffs, pop hooks and folk melodies to create an eclectic aural tapestry.
The subverted spirituality of her new style felt especially acute in the ecclesiastical venue. Near-liturgical lyrics became echoing howls of loneliness; cries of faltering faith. In Save Me From Your Kindness, the lyrics “Save me from your silence / Save me from your guidance” rang out like a strange, contrary prayer.
Rose’s irreverence was quick to show when a technical difficulty brought her very first song to an awkward halt. As her bassist wrestled with his instrument, Rose quipped: “No need to panic, Ben, the worst has already happened.”
She sat among her six-piece band, clearly more comfortable within their ranks. Opening the evening with a new song, Solo(w), Rose sang “Something’s missing / When I am solo(w), solo(w), solo(w), solo(w)” – repeating the pun and daring us to agree.
If the performance proved anything, it’s that the opposite is true. Rose’s band were skilled, but the swelling strings, deliberate bass and experimental percussion often eclipsed her delicate vocals.
The insecurities that made her latest album such a triumph held Rose back onstage. Her usually assured vibrato occasionally slipped into a nervous quaver, and constant self-deprecation dominated her audience patter.
As a former backing singer, Rose had clearly become accustomed to working in the shadows. She thanked her fellow musicians endlessly, and brought her support act, Samantha Crain, back on to share the final number before the encore. Fittingly, it was Song After Song, in which Rose sings, “Maybe I’m not as good as the girl I hear next door.”
Her aversion to ego is endearing; but she performs with the modesty of a support act, a soundtrack singer, a backing vocalist. Her latest album is a quest for faith; hopefully Rose will find belief in herself.
