Gig review: Benjamin Francis Leftwich, Cabaret Voltaire, Edinburgh

HAVING just turned 22, York-born singer-songwriter Benjamin Francis Leftwich has plenty of time to develop his craft – which is just as well, given the shortage of variety and substance on display in his barely hour-long set.

With his tousled, little-boy-lost demeanour and semi-bashful chat between songs, Leftwich seems a highly personable sort. But I can’t help feeling that hyperbolic accolades like Radio 1 DJ Zane Low’s description of debut single Pictures, late last year, as “The Hottest Record in the World Today” are doing him few favours at this stage, especially given the stiff competition in the guitar-toting sensitive-souls market.

Leftwich’s trademark breathy, whispery vocals not only came across as needlessly contrived and overwrought, but cumulatively revealed the narrowness and shallowness of his expressive register, beyond a pervasive wistful melancholy – shortcomings further highlighted by a cover of his “favourite song in the world”, Bruce Springsteen’s Atlantic City, in which the requisite elements of hard-earned grit and sinew were conspicuous by their absence.

Barring a couple of numbers where things livened up to mid-tempo, the material’s uniformly slow pace, evanescent melodies and simple guitar backing grew increasingly repetitious, compounded by vaguely evocative but frequently vacuous lyrics. Leftwich’s most memorable song by far is Atlas Hands, lead single off July’s debut album Last Smoke Before the Snowstorm, which he saved till last – but by then he’d seemingly exhausted the audience’s interest, as the applause swiftly died away, leaving no call for an encore.

Rating: **