Ten Tonnes, AKA Ethan Barnett, is the younger brother of Radio 1 favourite George Ezra, but boy, he’s way better. Back in May, I took myself off to the Brude to see him in action. He followed some pretty lively, soon-to-play-Bingley-Weekender support, who go by the name of Only the Poets. I didn’t catch all of their set, but they definitely had something feisty about their character. 

Under the Ten Tonnes moniker, Barnett provided a schooling in how to keep an audience on their toes. As a fan of his older material — namely the catchy, quintessentially indie ‘Cracks Between’ and boisterous, angsty ‘Silver Heat’ — I was hoping to hear them, but didn’t realistically expect him to wheel them back out. That said, I didn’t go home disappointed — the muted riffs that bleed into the harsh, punk-influenced, riotous chorus of ‘Silver Heat’ was even better in person than through earphones.

The gig was part of Ten Tonnes’ album-release tour, so it was only fitting that he played ‘Lucy’ and ‘Counting Down’, two softer offerings but both with banger scribbled all over them. You can’t deny the infectiousness of ‘Wake Up’ either, which has a playful but schoolboy naïvety to its credit. I still find ‘G.I.V.E.’ way too pop-centric for my taste, but sure, he nailed that on stage as well. 

It was an enjoyable gig and the energy was seamless. Would I have preferred to have gone to Bakar’s gig in Leeds that night? Potentially…