Photo: WENN
It’s been over two years since Sam Smith first claimed our attention when he was featured on Disclosure’s ‘Latch’ - and wonderfully we seem to have all forgotten what life was ever like without him.
This news, however, seems yet to have registered with the humble singer as he walks out on stage as if he were shuffling into a stranger’s house party. Diving straight into a haunting rendition of ‘Life Support’, there’s no messing about as Smith pummels the audience relentlessly with magically, spine-tinglingly wonderful tunes one after the other.
The screams and yells from the audience are so deafening one would have been forgiven for thinking they’d accidentally wandered into a Prince or Beyoncé gig; the brilliant Brixton Academy’s vaulted ceiling magnifying and reflecting the frenzied screams so much so that eardrums were perforating left right and centre.
At no other time was this truer than after his heart-aching performances of current single ‘Lay Me Down’ and gorgeous acoustic version of ‘Latch’ – the song that pelted him to fame in the first place. Throughout the show, Smith’s humility and awe in the face of his own stardom are evident. As he admits partway through the set; “…a year and a half ago I was living in a shitty little flat in Oval…” the ‘bloody hell look at me now’ sentiment tacked on silently at the end.
Constantly gazing out into the adoring faces of his fans, you can’t help but feel a rush of warmth towards him for his unassuming and grounded demeanour. Ending the show in a blaze of glory with a deafening rendition of ‘Stay With Me’, Smith leaves the stage the same way he came on…but something tells us he’s not leaving that party for a long time yet.
