It’s a preternatural buzz in the back of the skull, under the skin and touching three-striped shell-toes.
It’s a sense of something special, seeping out from two towns, too often decried and downtrodden, but no more.
This night is Bedford and Luton unified. Together. Learning to love more.
It’s the feeling in The Scruff’s poignant ‘Her’, and bare-chested talisman Adam Urwin’s dedication to dialysis-dosed drummer Omar Kouch.
Adam Urwin of The Scruff
It’s the celebration in the back-where-we-belong football chant of “we are Luton Town” and in the frenzied obedience of an audience perched in the palm of The Wholls’ Tordy Cocchiarella as the band tear through their latest single Going Down.
Tordy Cocchiarella of The Wholls
Mostly emphatically it’s a whole world firmly at the feet of Tom Grennan.
Stripped back to the barest of bones, sparks burn bright with inspiration from yet-to-drop debut album ‘Lightning Matches’, as hope crackles with possibility in the ‘Barbed Wire’ proclamation of “don’t let people hold you back, gotta stand tall and aim higher”.
The tribal “Na na na” of ‘Sober’ could have spilled forth from the Saturday terraces, while the singalong in ‘Praying’ comes at Grennan’s request, conscious that cooperation is perhaps the key to suspending the L.A. creep of jet-lag. No sleep ‘til Luton.
And despite offering a “dyslexic lyricist” disclaimer, there’s not the slightest difficulty in delivering the anthemic swoon of ‘I Might’.
With an effortlessly innate talent destined to fill stadiums and soundtrack the summer, Grennan’s short set is repeatedly extended at the command of a crowd calling for “one more song”, eager to prolong this extraordinarily intimate alchemy on a soon-to-be-scarce scale.
And while the ruffian swagger of the ‘Old Days’ finale sees him proclaim “Gypsy Tom has come out to play”, to send new devotees darting into the night, it’s the spine-tinglingly sensational ‘Something in the Water’ that lifts hands high in hallelujah.
Vulnerable. Raw. Powerful. Soul-sating.
Luton bathes it in because, on this exceptional night, they’ve found what they’ve been looking for.
Tom Grennan is theirs. Pretty soon he’ll belong to the world.
Words by James Cunliffe
All photos by Paul Lyme, PJ Photography
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This gig was put on by The Love Moore Collective to raise money for the UK's leading charity for homeless young people, Centrepoint. At the time of going to press they had raised an astounding £700. Massive respect to the girls from the whole Transmission team. We can't wait for the next one.
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