Concert Review: LOUISA JOHNSON, indigo2, London

Because there’s nothing better to do on a Friday evening than go and enjoy some live music, when I found out that Louisa Johnson would be playing a gig at indigo2, I thought ‘why not?’ Granted, my knowledge of her didn’t go much beyond the fact that I was aware she’d won X Factor a few years ago, and had some pretty decent bops on the radio. You’d hope as well that the winner of X Factor could actually sing, so I felt certain that I’d hear some good music anyway.

Upon arrival, it became clear that this was actually a charity concert raising money for the Charlton Athletic Community Trust, which celebrates its 25^th year this year. We were therefore told that we would be hearing from a number of acts found ‘right in this community’ before the headliner herself came on. The show started with a short set from young sisters Rachael and Elizabeth who played songs they felt inspired them, including This is Me from The Greatest Showman, Alicia Keys’ Girl on Fire, and a Christian song.

This was followed by an interesting act called Cle who rapped a tune of her own composition with the somewhat catchy hook of ‘wavy, wavy, drip drip, wavy’ and encouraging the crowd to get ‘lit’. The final talent show act was Shania, who sang a pleasant rendition of Amy Winehouse’s Valerie as well as a Spanish song, with all of the acts who had performed dressed head to toe in Primark which was one of the evenings sponsors.

The official ‘opening act’ appeared to be Autumn Sherif, an artist from the community who had auditioned for The Voice and was now pursuing a solo career. I wasn’t familiar with her, but was very impressed from the first few notes of Chaka Khan’s Ain’t Nobody where she was able to flaunt her lovely soulful and gospel-like voice.

She played a mixture of her own songs and covers like a funky version of Dua Lipa’s New Rules and helped to engage the audience by splitting us up to sing different bits. She did a good job of both warming the crowd up with energy and cooling them down with slow, deep and groovy tracks too, before making way for the main act of the evening.

Louisa Johnson, who I believe is now using the stage name Louisa, took to the stage in a black and white pantsuit launching straight into So Good, a party anthem about not being supposed to go out but falling victim to wanting to stay out until the sun comes up. With this, it becomes evidently clear as to why she won X Factor as her voice is truly something to be admired.

Her ever so slightly raspy voice continued to shine on new song Bad Habit and a cover of Justin Bieber’s Love Yourself which, even if you weren’t familiar with Louisa’s own tracks, you’d be sure to know. This was followed by the fun and upbeat Unpredictable, originally recorded as a duet with Olly Murs but gave Louisa the opportunity to encourage the crowd to sing along on his parts and achieve Cle’s earlier goal of getting the crowd ‘lit’.

She continued with her self-proclaimed favourite release Best Behaviour which again highlighted just how good these pop songs that she sings are. Each and every one has the potential to be a commercial radio hit, which I think is particularly important for artists nowadays and even more so for those who rose to fame through talent shows and have the potential to all too quickly be forgotten. I hope this won’t be the case for Louisa.

A highlight of the evening was her cover of Ed Sheeran’s Shape of You which I would have been equally happy had she recorded it herself as it sounded great and fit her voice perfectly. The evening ended with club anthem Yes and of course her first official release which wasn’t even her own, Clean Bandit’s Tears. I’m unsurprised this was such a commercial success given how well Louisa sang it on stage. I was thoroughly shocked to hear that this was the first headline show she’d ever done, so what a treat for us! No doubt there’ll be many more where that came from.

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