Review: BBC PROMS AT SAGE GATESHEAD: SELF ESTEEM & ROYAL NORTHERN SINFONIA, Sage Gateshead

I like my orchestral music organised around Northern talent. An evening of two halves, this BBC Proms event saw Nottingham (which is geographically more North than South, so let’s forget for a moment that it’s in the midlands) was repped by four-piece band Divorce. Then, Rotherham-born Self-Esteem - or Rebecca Lucy Taylor, a seedling national treasure – performed an hour-long set “with some surprises”, primarily performing her own work with new arrangements by Colin Elliot.

Divorce performed sans-orchestra; a band that may be idly attributed to “indie”, yet is more of a genre-contorting blend of pop, rock, grunge, and country with a teaspoon of screamo. The band’s breadth of sound feels enabled by the celestial vocals of Tiger Cohen-Towell, with almost-emo, honey-smooth sounds from Felix Mackenzie-Barrow (vocals/guitar).

The former almost absentmindedly fingers the bass whilst taking us to church. “Services”, from their 2022 EP “Get Mean”, starts them off, and we move through “Sex”, and “Birds”, which exhibit their strong suits which are catchy guitar melodies, stage presence, and immense storytelling through lyrics. In “Checking Out”, I hear “I smell the guilt on him as he / Smothers me with buffers and his / Winter coat that he just won't take off” and gasp.

Adam Peter Smith (guitar) and Kasper Sandstrom (drums) are really cool. There’s not a more intelligent set of epithets for them because they just do what they do with heaps of flair, and very well.

By the second half, we’re a warm audience. Divorce has conducted us into a symphony of birds, and everyone around seems extremely giddy. When the Royal Northern Sinfonia swoop onto the stage, they seem infected with it, too. Sub-Principal Cellist Gabriel Waite is doing a silly little wave at us as he enters, and I wonder if it’s quite nice sometimes for pop to take the edge off the formality of classical music. (Of course, we wave back).

And so, Self-Esteem slinks on with her entourage of angels, backing vocalists Seraphina D’Arby, Levi Heaton, Sophie Galpin, and Marged Sion, and delivers hits from her first two albums Compliments Please and I Do This All the Time. The deceptively complex melodies of “F***ing Wizardry” (so Radio Three), “Prioritise Pleasure”, “Just Kids” and “I’m Fine” well befit the string-heavy style of the Royal Northern Sinfonia. I’m sure a lot of fancy and complicated things had to be done by Colin Elliot to get the arrangements right, but the orchestral ensemble fits Self-Esteem like a glove.

Speaking of which, the orchestra members were living their best lives. Shout out to the double bass section (Siân Hicks and Philip Nelson), who thrive under the fun collab of Self Esteem x Robert Ames (conductor), and carry the set to euphoria with their short, sharp plucking and ACTUAL giggling (professional giggling, appropriate to the event).

The evening nears its close with the aforementioned surprise – Self Esteem’s quietly powerful version of George Michael’s "Praying for Time". I don’t know, it was just all wonderful.

I’m out of words and living in the memory of an evening of some F***ing WIZARDRY.

You can hear it all on Radio Three on BBC Sounds… off you pop.

The BBc Proms continues until 9 September

Photo credit: Thomas Jackson / Tynesight Media 

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