BROOKE COMBE // BRUDENELL SOCIAL CLUB, LEEDS
BROOKE COMBE PERFORMING AT LEEDS BRUDENELL SOCIAL CLUB
★★★★★ (5/5)
BROOKE COMBE
If she keeps going the way she is it’s only a matter of time until Brooke Combe is a global superstar, is the world ready for a straight talking Edinburgh singer that isn’t Shirley Manson? I really hope so as she has class in abundance and writes fantastic songs never mind sings them perfectly.
The support act, Ruby J, from the Midlands has a very unique voice, a sort of mix of jazz and blues with a touch of rock thrown in for good measure. She used it to full effect, there was just her, her guitar and her backing guitarist but the amount of noise they could make was amazing! She has a lot of talent, and I suspect next time she’s at the Brudenell she won’t be a support act. She has some tremendous songs but she took it to a totally different level with a cover of No Diggity, it was immense, the whole crowd joined in and sang both verse and chorus but the brilliant thing was she made the song very much her own, she should seriously consider releasing it as a single, it was almost unrecognisable from the original but totally brilliant.
Brooke came on stage just after 9 and treated us to a tour de force, she has a natural way about her, a candour that instantly wins the crowd over, this was not her first visit to the Brudenell, the fact she, and her band, were clearly having lots of fun on stage was obvious, she laughed, she engaged with the audience, one of whom had arrived from Dubai and she warmed up perfectly for her headline show at the Barrowlands the next night.
She was open with us early on that she hadn’t really been up for the gig but once she was on the crowd got her up for it. She was also open about the fact she used to want to get on and off stage as quickly as possible, that has clearly all changed, Brooke was an artist who was clearly at ease with her craft, her backing band were immense and she herself was fantastic in her delivery, singing as well as I’ve heard her (this was not my first time seeing Brooke).
She played just over an hour with an encore which was really an excuse for a comfort break, songs such as A Game, This Town, Lanewood Pines, Black is the New Gold and a cover of Summer Breeze were delivered perfectly, there was singing, there was dancing, there was some swearing but that was mostly Brooke herself, this was a pitch prefect performance.
As I said earlier it is surely just a matter of time until super stardom beckons for Brooke, it couldn’t happen to a nicer, more down to earth, lovelier person with an amazing voice and some serious song writing skills. As she said herself, she wrote some of the songs when she was 16, she is turning 26 in October. You could tell when she is up on that stage, she finally feels she belongs, which she definitely does.