The Leisure Society began 2016 with a 3 week tour of Italy in a pared down acoustic-trio formation, comprising founding members Nick Hemming, Christian Hardy and Mike Siddell. Their ‘Trip To Italy’ proved to be hugely inspirational, giving them the opportunity to revisit an ever-growing collection of songs from 4 albums that began with 2009’s The Sleeper.
“We couldn’t stop making music in Italy,” explains Nick, “we were finishing our acoustic shows then heading outside into the piazzas to play acoustic after-shows!”
This September the band is bringing that Italian inspiration back to venues in the UK, with a 4-date tour of intimate venues in Oxford, Shrewsbury, Salford and London.
“These UK dates are entirely for our fans,” says Christian, “we’re going to crowdsource the setlist using our social media pages; so it should be a totally different show every night.”
Formed in 2009 by Nick Hemming and Christian Hardy, their landmark single ‘The Last Of The Melting Snow’ was championed by Mark Radcliffe and Maconie on Radio 2 and Elbow’s Guy Garvey on 6Music and within months of its release, Nick had been nominated for an Ivor Novello award, to rapturous media attention. Richard Thompson invited the band to play at his Meltdown Festival and there was another Ivor Novello nomination. They packed a tent at Glastonbury and Brian Eno declared himself a fan, as did Ray Davies, who booked the band to play at his Meltdown festival.
Bea Sanjust is a singer-songwriter from Rome, who has played shows with Mumford & Sons and various members of The Willkommen Collective, along with performing at the Green Man and Big Chill festivals. Her album ‘Larosa’ is out now, which sees her mix modern English Folk, Americana and Psychedelia, with her elements of Latin soul
