Ellie Goulding Live at Cardiff University's Student Union
Cardiff Student Union's Great Hall has
usually quite a few big names and concerts on display, but perhaps it
is not as often that two great female voices come together in a
single concert. Ellie Goulding's concert was opened by Lulu James, an
amazing singer and performer from the UK. She started her show
covered in black clothes - something like the evil old lady from Snow
White – to then remove her veil whilst singing with her deep sultry
voice, revealing a sparkly headdress and a black swimsuit. James sang
sweet songs like Be Safe and
Sweetest Thing and
even the amazing Closer
with her very provoking vocal.
Lulu James has a powerful voice and an artistic figure, which seems
to get associated to Grace Jones quite a lot for that image. She must
have brought quite the crowd as some people seemed to know all her
stuff, however, to some like me – she was a very pleasant surprise.
James led a static crowd waiting for Goulding.
“I am wearing a skirt that's also
like...shorts. And that's great, because I hate being a girl.”
That
was the opening line when Ellie Goulding walked on stage talking
about her outfit to a crowd screaming and cheering. She also
described herself as a shy girl, something that you would not really
guess by her range of voice and how dominant she is on stage.
Goulding's songs have an amazing beat live, and it helps that she
plays drums on stage – driving the crowd wild. She also asked the
crowd to dance and said she could see the boys not enjoying it as
much. She then proceeded to sing and point out at guys who were not
dancing – all in good fun. Many classic songs were sung on stage
like Explosions, Figure 8, Hanging On and
the singer even explained that Elton John was very supportive of her
cover of Your Song. One
of the concert highlights for me, was perhaps her acoustic version of
Guns and Horses, where
she picked up a guitar and strummed it while singing and her voice
sounded even deeper. Overall, Goulding really puts up quite a show
where you can't really leave disappointed. She interacts with the
crowd, she sings and she entertains – showing a lot of respect for
all the fans there to see her.
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| Ellie Goulding with her guitar |
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Lulu James and her crown looking headdress
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Words and images by Andy Love
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