Review: Leah McFall, Louisiana

My housemates and I have a slightly perverse ritual of watching TV talent shows and spending the duration of them ripping them to shreds. Every year when shows like The Voice or X Factor come around, we whine about how contrived, soulless and annoying these shows are: yet we dutifully tune in.

I guess we guiltily enjoy the grotesqueness of it all – and who doesn’t love to judge absolute strangers from the comfort of their own sofa? Though these shows are inundated with singers who seem more preoccupied with snatching at a fleeting moment of fame than they do musicianship, there are occasional exceptions to that trend: Leah McFall is one of those.

With a stunning vocal range that would make Mariah Carey turn several shades of green and a distinctly kooky aesthetic, The Voice runner up Leah was a genuinely intriguing presence to watch. She amassed millions of YouTube views for her performances and many expressed disbelief that she did not win the competition.

But as is too often the way, Leah seemed to disappear without trace for a year after the show’s end before releasing tepid single Home under producer will.i.am in 2014 to little fanfare. She is one of the few singers from a TV talent show I often thought I’d have supported had she only had the opportunity to record her own music. After four long years, Leah has finally come out from under the thumb of restrictive contracts and forged her own bold and brave path.

Support was provided by fellow former Voice contestant Anna McLuckie, who played a short but charming set of ethereal folk songs accompanied by drums, bass and her own harp playing. Her clear and earnest vocals shone the most when she stripped back the sound to just singing and harp, best showcased on the subtly affecting song Dear.

There was half an hour between her set and Leah’s, which undermines the point of a warm up act. Once Leah arrived, it felt that the audience weren’t as receptive as they would have been had she followed straight after Anna. I felt for her as she came onto the stage to polite, lukewarm applause. The audience weren’t fully responsive until about halfway through the set and I could see this awkward energy effected Leah a little. As a performer myself, I can empathise with the uphill struggle of trying to give a winning performance to a stiff audience.

That said, her vocals started off strong and were flawless throughout. She began with an artful mash-up of her single Home and R&B classic Try Again by Aaliyah. On her new EP INK, an acronym for I Now Know, she has gone with an electronic alt R&B sound which has become rather overdone in the musical zeitgeist of late.

However, I enjoyed the deep and hypnotic soundscape of the tracks and the use of vocal effects were powerful but not excessive. I really cannot fault Leah’s singing ability, but if I were to be hyper critical I would say she could afford to be more sparing with the vocal acrobatics. Yes, her falsetto is haunting, seductive, soaring…name your adjective. But chucking it into every song undermined its power – if she could learn to use it less frequently it would have much more resonance.

Highlights of the set included a warm and sensual love song dedicated to her boyfriend (a truly sweet and genial guy who was acting as doorman for the night) and her popular rendition of I Will Survive that she first performed on The Voice.

As the crowd warmed up, so did Leah’s patter between songs. In her lilting Irish accent, she cracked jokes about dating douchebags and the cringiness of encores and expressed her relief that she could finally be herself as an artist. The pain and struggle she has experienced in the music industry was implicit despite her cheery demeanour and her final untitled track of the night (jokingly referred to as her ’emo song’) was a powerful ode to being true to yourself.

The sentiment is well trodden, but Leah’s sincerity was so moving that I almost teared up as she sung her heart out on it. In her, I saw the pain and isolation of trying to make it as an artist in a cut throat and fickle industry. She detailed how her and her boyfriend funded and organised the tour off their own backs, promoting the gigs on nothing but Leah’s social media. Her eyes shone with tears as she expressed her joy and surprise at how many people had shown up to support her.

At the end, she encouraged anyone who wanted to to say hi after the show and seemed keen to get to know her fans. This is clearly a woman who has been kept away from what she loves to do for a long time and her sense of rejuvenation is clear. I walked away from the gig marvelling at Leah’s vocal prowess but also feeling validated in the power of artistic authenticity. In an increasingly austere and harsh world, it’s hard to strike out on your own and trust that you will reap the dividends of your choices. I didn’t know it walking in, but Leah’s compelling testament to perseverance was exactly what I needed to hear.

Leah McFall played the Louisiana on Monday, April 17. For more Louisiana lineups, visit www.thelouisiana.net