★ When the accounting comes up for the brightest creative stars in Britrock, there needs to be a reckoning for whoever keeps missing Jamie Lenman off the list. Embarking on his solo acoustic tour, Lenman is in his element as he carries shows purely with charm, hook-abundant songs and dry wit. “So where are we, Ballbag Heath?” he deadpans, a tongue-in-cheek jab at the show’s relocation from Birmingham city centre to Balsall Heath.
All is taken in good humour, however, and the audience quickly gets sucked into his idiosyncratic sense of off-the-cuff humour and unpredictable sonic adventurism, with the expanse of his songwriting on full display as he mixes solo material, covers and the odd cut from his old band Reuben. Even acoustic, the power of Summer Of Discontent (The Future Is Dead) is self-evident, while the likes of I Ain’t Your Boy showcase his capacity for encasing witheringly world-weary lyrical content inside alluring melodies.