There’s something about a packed-out, school-night club gig that makes a pop star in the making feel inevitable. Rose Gray’s sold-out headline show at Colour Factory last night – a sweaty oasis in the otherwise desolate intersection of Hackney and Stratford – was just that. Held upstairs but carrying a distinct basement vibe, the room was heaving long before Gray hit the stage, anticipation rumbling as the floor threatened to buckle beneath the throng of girls and gays.
The stage animates at quarter past nine, Gray’s whispering spoken word track, ‘Hackney Wick’ a fitting opener for the East London girl’s hometown gig. She emerges to a club remix of ‘Damn’, which sets the tone immediately: bass booming, rave sunnies on, the wind machine a paid actor. Gray seamlessly transitions into ‘Just Two’, and there’s a moment of collective euphoria as the crowd belts back every word.
In the two months since the release of her dance-pop debut album, ‘Louder, Please‘, Gray has fastidiously honed her live show, supporting Confidence Man on the Europe leg of their tour before kicking off her own headline run in Manchester the night prior. The polish was evident from the get-go, but so was her genuine joy to be in the spotlight, actualising a dream years in the making.
Gray covers pretty much every song from her anthemic, club-centric record, and the crowd belts back the choruses to her on ‘Wet and Wild’, ‘Free’ and ‘Switch’. Glitter strands in her red hair catch the light as she twirls, the crowd an ocean of moving bodies. Not a soul stands still for the entirety of the set.
“I think it’s very important to play old songs too. I made this song when I was a little Rose”, Gray says before winding it back to 2020 with a brief rendition of her euphoric Balearic banger, ‘Save Your Tears’, followed by 2022’s ethereal ‘Promise Me’.
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While Gray’s vocal strength often gets lost beneath the overpowering backing tracks, songs such as ‘Tectonic’ allow her to show off her range, sunset visuals on the screen behind syncing perfectly with the emotive chorus. “You look so fucking beautiful,” she tells the crowd, visibly taking in the moment for the downtempo, reflective ‘Everything Changes (But I Won’t)’.
Gray switches things back up again by teasing a new track, a pulsating club banger with the refrain “God is a DJ”, reminiscent of SOPHIE’s trance-techno brilliance. But it was ‘Louder, Please’s most experimental number, ‘Angel of Satisfaction’, that unexpectedly brought the biggest singalong of the night thus far.
Before inevitably closing out with ‘Party People’, for which Gray got the entire crowd jumping – so much that the floorboards threatened to break – Gray treated us to another new song – as yet unnamed – inspired by a girl called April she met on night out, who had an unmatched appetite for partying. I’m calling it now – a deluxe version of ‘Louder, Please’ surely beckons.
With a tight set providing 45 minutes of pure in-the-moment escapism, Rose Gray is undoubtedly cementing herself at the forefront of the partygirl renaissance, carrying the spirit of last year’s Brat Summer straight into this one.
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Words: Aimee Phillips
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