Review Music: Adele | Union Chapel | BRIT talent school

Publications by New Journal Enterprises

Home

Archive

Competition

The Review - MUSIC - grooves with ROISIN GADELRAB
Published: 20 November 2008

In awe of Adele’s little soul session

REVIEW: ADELE
Union Chapel

IT’S easy to be a little sneery about Adele Adkins, a graduate from the all-too-smug BRIT talent school in Croydon from which Amy Winehouse and Leona Lewis were hived.
Despite lacking a catchy pop song in her armoury like Rehab or Valerie, she is nonetheless often described as the next Winehouse – a lazy comparison which just makes it easy for people say: “Well, she’s not as good as Amy Winehouse, is she?”
Maybe she is, maybe she isn’t – but wherever Adele ranks in the throaty Brit talent league tables, she was superb at the Union Chapel for the annual Little Noise Sessions.
Her delicate but crisp cover version of Bob Dylan’s Make You Feel My Love was just about the finest live music moment I’ve seen all year – a near perfect lullaby which left pew after pew in awe. It was a surprise. Her gobby interludes – “Eh, Barack Obama, yeah we can and all that, that’s good, innit, I was well ’appy bout that” – come straight from EastEnders’ central casting, and can be grating on as many occasions as they are infectious.
But the switch she can make is dramatic. A sudden flip from a back of the bus, txtn’ 19-year-old to a sensitive guitarist and singer capable of conjuring up the maturity of soulful, doleful bursts like Chasing Pavements and Cold Shoulder.
She revelled in the stripped down, acoustic nature of this annual festival in the Chapel, expertly put together by DJ Jo Wiley to raise money for Mencap. Little Noise produces special moments every year, and this was another one.
RICHARD OSLEY

Comment on this article.
(You must supply your full name and email address for your comment to be published)

Name:

Email:

Comment:

Check Prices, Availability & Book Online
Receive Online Discounts and Instant Confirmation

» Rock & Pop
» Gig Listings
» Classical & Jazz
» C&J Listings
» Book concerts/gigs
» Buy CDs