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Summer Camp returned to Birmingham on Sunday a little older, a little wiser, and a little funkier.
Supporting them were Fryars, who combine the soulful vocals and keyboards of James Blake and Bon Iver with glitchy beats, grooving bass and off the wall banter. Playing songs from an album due in 2014, they’re ones to catch if you get chance.
Soon, with film and TV clips from the 80s and beyond projected behind them as always, Summer Camp take to the stage, the husband and wife duo Elizabeth Sankey and Jeremy Warmsley accompanied by drummer William and new bassist Nathan. Leaning heavily on tracks from their recently released self-titled sophomore album, a record stripped of the characters from their early work and brimming with confidence, the extra bodies onstage combine to make this gig louder and richer.
Opening with the pulsing The End, they soon tear through funky lead single Fresh – maybe the best song they’ve recorded to date – and album highlights Crazy, Night Drive and Pink Summer. With Warmsley darting between instruments, Sankey is as charismatic a frontwoman as you will ever see. Every roll of the eyes and every wave of the hand adds another dimension to the words she sings. “Thank you for coming out on a Sunday night when I’m sure Ballykissangel is on,” she says, dedicating a song to a fan who had brought them cookies.
Their retro aesthetic and Sankey’s delivery is perfectly captured during a cover of Biz Markie’s 90s hit Just A Friend, which is segued nicely into first album single, Losing My Mind. EP tracks Round The Moon, Ghost Train and Always join Condale tunes Down and the always-brilliant Better Off Without You in a tight set, before the building Two Chords and obsessive anthem I Want You bring the evening to a thrilling end.
