Photography by 2 Square Image
On Saturday, we were in Reading for outside:inside festival. Headlining the night in St. Laurence’s Church were Summer Camp. In a summery dress and whale-adorned tee (respectively), Elizabeth and Jeremy modestly stepped down from the loft area onto the church floor. A few ‘youths’ had decided to come after hearing about their hit single, ‘Round The Moon’, and were quizzing the band sarcastically about the one song they had heard of.
However, when Elizabeth broke into song standing in the middle of the audience, supported by Jeremy’s acoustic guitar, their jaws quickly hit the floor. Her heart-breaking voice resonated from the church walls, sending a tingle down my spine as they played ‘Better Off Without You’. An entirely acoustic set, this rendition of both new and old songs was well suited to the acoustics of the large church, wowing the crowd as Elizabeth danced around Jeremy in a manner reminiscent of Kate Bush. The crowd were soon clapping along, myself included, before they took to the stage.
Aftter introducing themselves to their new fans (I wholeheartedly believe that everyone left that church a fan if they weren’t one when they came in) they began to play ‘Round The Moon’. The on-stage chemistry was almost tangible, working wonderfully together as Jeremy and Elizabeth sang what is now my favourite version of that song. Jeremy is just as skilled, if not more so, with an acoustic guitar than any other instrument and I would love to hear the band produce more acoustic songs in the future.
The highlight of their set was definitely ‘Veronica Sawyer’. Elizabeth actually walked among the audience, singing inches from peoples’ faces, each lyric expressed wonderfully and punctuated beautifully by Jeremy’s guitar. I had only ever heard the new album track, ‘Losing My Mind’, as a plugged-in version previously and the harrowing lyrics of the acoustic version broke a small piece of me. A telling narrative of when relationships don’t always work, Jeremy and Elizabeth joined in a harmony: ‘You don’t love me like you used to, you don’t love me like you used to. I. Can’t. Do. This. Any more.’
They closed the show with a new track from the album, ‘Welcome to Condale’, perfectly capturing the feeling of growing up in small-town America. The story telling in their music always amazes me, and again I related to the fact that we never grow out of the towns we grow up in and the people we grow up with: ‘You never run away…I’m coming home‘
Summer Camp’s debut album will be out in October. You can still pledge to get the album out in return for amazing gifts, with 10% going to Shelter From The Storm.
Look out for our interview soon!
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