Independent Venues Week: English Teacher are Writing R&B for You

Written and Edited by Eve Moat

Monday 29^th January brought the up-and-coming band English Teacher to the intimate venue The Trades Club in Hebden Bridge, just up the road from where the lead singer, Lily Fontaine, grew up in Colne. The band coming out of Leeds proved the talent that the city is producing, and how wonderful it is to hear local music in local independent venues.

Entering the venue from the rainy outdoors of a dark, windy Hebden Bridge, the warmth hit into me, and I immediately felt at home. A typical working men’s club, with proper pub-vibes, and the frontage of a back-door music club. It was like all the little pubs I’d ventured into in the north as a kid, and the intimate music venues I’d experienced the comfort of as I’ve grown older. Later in the night, Fontaine remarked that 2023 had been the year that most independent venues had closed in recent history, and thanked everyone for coming down to support The Trades Club and help small venues continue to live on and support promising new talents, especially local musicians.

To start, the support band Nightbus took to the stage just after I arrived: a three-piece band with an unusual sound, defined into a genre only by their heavy guitars and crunching rhythms. Playing tracks with different vocal arrangements and a set that made me feel all different emotions, the new band from just over in Manchester gave servings of their debut indie track and left me sipping my lime and soda at the bar in a content state.

After a short interlude (and a bit of shuffling forward through the crowd from myself), the avidly awaited English Teacher graced the stage. The band consists of Lily Fontaine (as aforementioned) as lead vocals; Lewis Whiting on guitar; Douglas Frost on drums; and Nicholas Eden on bass. Opening with one of their newer tracks ‘Nearly Daffodils’ got the crowd going and the tempo soared throughout the venue. It embodied a great mix of soothing vocals with gritty sounds and heavy instrumental: a well-planned way to start off their set. With each song came new lighting, creating a beautiful haze around Fontaine and a lovely ambience around the warm room. The colourful lights mirrored the feeling of each track and embodied the collective feeling of the crowd in relation to the music.

Some of my favourite English Teacher tracks ‘A55’ and ‘Mastermind Specialism’ came back to back in the setlist and complimented each other perfectly. The soft melodies falling off the strings of the guitar in both songs accompanied by calming, deep vocals left the whole room swaying and staring on in awe. Fontaine even remarked that ‘A55’ is about drinking too much, and that ‘Mastermind Specialism’ is about making bad decisions (usually caused by drinking too much), which got the crowd laughing along. She also asked, “can you tell I’m trying to fill time?”, reminding the crowd of their new band status. However, the crowd didn’t care that they were inexperienced as we continued to cheer them on and lapped up every bit of their performance. The subsequent track was ‘You Blister My Paint’, which isn’t a regular in my music listening but was beautiful, with heart-wrenching lyrics and almost semi-operatic vocals and left the crowd applauding and cheering.

One of my favourite new tracks of theirs is ‘The World’s Biggest Paving Slab’ because of its groovy nature, catchy bassline, and guitar harmonies. When this was announced, I started bopping along, and it was many times more amazing hearing it live than through the speaker in my phone (despite how much I loved it the first time I heard it). Another older track from their discography was the penultimate song of the set, with ‘R&B’ getting the crowd to go a little crazy, as does the song as it continues. ‘R&B’ talks about how English Teacher “despite appearances, [I] haven’t got the voice for R&B” but “[I’ve] been writing R&B”, showing the irony in these statements, along with the fact that people may think they look like an R&B band, but they’re solely indie, rock and drops of folk, suggesting you shouldn’t judge a book by it cover.

Finishing with their latest release ‘Albert Road’, written as an ode to Colne, was a perfect end to a brilliant event for an incredible event. I could’ve listened to English Teacher all night long, and I would recommend you take a walk with them down Albert Road too.