Heart-warming enough to send shivers down your spine -George Ezra live at the O2 arena

George Ezra live at the O2 arena

Chart-topping artist George Ezra recently headlined a sold-out gig at the O2 arena, armed with a catalogue of well-known hits and accompanied by a seven-man band.

As the band begin to play the unmistakeable instrumental of Anyone for You (Tiger Lily), Ezra takes to the stage, dressed in a Gold Rush Kid denim jacket, taking in the packed-out arena before he begins to sing the upbeat hit in a joyously distinctive voice that could not be mistaken for anyone else but the star.

The 29-year-old radiates positivity and happiness, particularly during hits like Green Green Grass which he described to the audience was written from an old journal entry as he looked back. He was sitting in a field with friends and heard music coming from somewhere. He explained that he had to find where the music was coming from and upon further exploration, he discovered there was a celebration to remember three people who had died in a ‘beautiful celebration of life.’

The band stepped down a few songs in, leaving just Ezra and a pianist on the stage as they performed a series of emotive songs including Hold My Girl and Sweetest Human Being Alive, heart-warming enough to send shivers down your spine.

Lively visuals filled the stage during Saviour and more prominently Did You Hear the Rain? with flashes of light mimicking the effect of lightening and matching up to the pace of the song, complementing its sombre tones.

Support came from Passenger who shot to fame in 2012 with Let Her Go – which he acknowledged early on, joking that he only had one famous song, “I’m sure that there are some people that would rather I play that one song eight times,” and even if the audience didn’t know the lyrics to any of his other songs the artist encouraged them to sing along the whole time, offering them lyrics to the chorus of I Hate, a humour-filled song about all the things he hates, which include ‘pointless status updates on Facebook.’

Passenger

Whilst Ezra performed Paradise, a song that is the epitome of George Ezra music and the most energy-filled track of the night, it proved to be a huge hit with the audience and a huge grin was plastered across the singers face as he took a couple of steps towards the crowd mid-song to absorb the atmosphere.

Arguably, the star of the show however was Ezra’s guitarist, who throughout the set was constantly hyping up the audience. Towards the end of the night, he was even doing star jumps to encourage the audience to clap along.

George Ezra and his band

The singer brought the show to a close with the summer anthem of 2018, Shotgun, as part of the encore where he seemed to let himself go and even execute a couple of sneaky dance moves.

This was the first of two shows Ezra was set to perform at the London venue, however the following day (March 14) it was announced he was suffering from acute vertigo and the show has since been rescheduled for April 6.