LIVE FROM THE PIT: Frank Turner, The Lottery Winners and The Meffs

Frank Turner is making his way onto the stage for the 3000th time in his career, on an Alexandra Palace stage which has started to feel like home turf. It is the fifth time he has headlined the iconic North London venue, on top of the countless shows in surrounding bars across his 20-year career. There remains a faint ridiculousness, to both him and his audience, that he ever made it out of those bars in the first place. The irony of his opening two songs, The Ballad of Me and My Friends and I Knew Prufrock Before He Got Famous – both odes to not quite making it – being sung back at him by 10,000 people is not lost on anyone, least of all Turner himself, who permanently exudes a level of bewilderment at his status. How then, did this perennial journeyman find himself to be a reliable arena filler two decades in?

The answer to this question can be found on the uniform for the evening. On the back of the limited edition Show 3000 shirt is a fill-in-the-blank prompt which says “my first show was ____”. More than a fun gimmick, it is an ingenious piece of marketing that, deliberately or otherwise, demonstrates his story to a tee. Frank Turner is an export of quite a fruitful mid-2000s London scene, responsible for names such as Jamie T, Florence + The Machine, and Justin Hayward-Young of The Vaccines. Whilst these contemporaries exploded, he toiled, playing show after show to comparatively modest fanfare. Though the fruits of this labour were not as immediately recognisable, it is at an event such as Show 3000 where they can be seen most starkly, because, if the t-shirts are to be believed, virtually no one in attendance is at their first Frank Turner show. As the limelight evaded him, Turner had to build his stock through alternative methods, and, following the punk instruction manual, he chose to do it through relentless gigging. His fiercely loyal fanbase largely spawned from accruing a handful of believers at each of the 2999 previous shows, admiring not only his perseverance, but also the genuine skill he possesses in front of a live audience. When you’re 3000 not out, you learn a thing or two about crowd control, and Frank has got it down to a fine art.

All of this is to say that Ally Pally’s patrons very much know what they’re in for, and they want more of it. So much so, that when Frank introduces the two rules of his shows, the crowd recite them back to him. “Rule 1. Don’t be a dick!”, gets perhaps the loudest cheer of the night, whilst “Rule 2. Sing along if you know the words!” is adhered to by nearly everybody. Single digit t-shirt wearers and newcomers alike join in with the monosyllabic singalong to new favourite Do One, whilst 2009’s Try This At Home still manages to generate crowd-surfers and circle-pits. This is one of the advantages to Frank’s slower route to the top: because so many of the crowd have been there for the journey, each song, regardless of age or streaming numbers, is greeted with the same warmth.

It is helpful, with this in mind, that the songs from Turner’s latest effort, Undefeated, are enthusiastic punk rock cuts, perfect for an audience who were clearly gagging for opportunities to participate. No Thank You For The Music’s intuitive clap-alongs and Girl From The Record Shop’s infectious, Ramones-like energy came across strongly, and allowed The Sleeping Souls, Frank’s band, to flex their muscles. Having been a full time ensemble since 2009’s Poetry of the Deed, the Souls are a well-oiled machine. New drummer Callum Green is the only replacement in the band’s history, and fits in seamlessly, adding a newfound strength and urgency to the older tracks in particular. Anti-fascist anthem 1933 benefits from his power, as does the shouty break-up lament Plain Sailing Weather.

Though Turner’s show is enhanced by the Souls’ presence, he does not wilt when faced with the chance to go solo for a short spell. Songs like The Road and Long Live The Queen doubtlessly found their final form at acoustic nights, so it feels fitting that they get wheeled out in this state on the big occasion. Of course, The Sleeping Souls aren’t benched for long, returning midway through The Way I Tend To Be to complete a closing run to the main set of staples. If Ever I Stray, Recovery, and Photosynthesis are punctuated only by the raucous, minute-long Never Mind The Back Problems, to send the unlucky few who had to catch an early train home happy.

Never one to short change an audience, Frank and The Souls returns for the encore with the title track to his latest album. Undefeated is an oddly intimate reflection on Turner’s unlikely rise, and undoubtedly a risky pick, but one which is seen to pay off when phone torches illuminate the palace. The energy isn’t dampened for long, as Polaroid Picture and Get Better spark the pits up once more, before Four Simple Words caps off the night. Frank has no hesitation in jumping straight into the crowd for this final number, before leading everybody in ballerina spins in the tune’s brief slower sequence. Seeing 10,000 people all clumsily shuffling in circles seems like a fittingly bizarre way to conclude a night celebrating one of the UK’s unlikeliest success stories. 

Throughout the course of his career, Frank Turner has had to compensate for his slow start, and his modus operandi to achieve this was always going above and beyond in his live show. He could be forgiven for taking it easy now that his place is secure, so it is all the more commendable that, even on a victory lap, he is still coming up with new and inventive ways to keep the audience involved. Turner once proudly proclaimed himself not just to be an artist, but an entertainer – inverting the perceived hierarchy of musical merit – and this is clearly a mantra which he lives by to this day. The live show is evidently Frank’s primary focus, and on a night so important to both him and his fans, it was impressive (if unsurprising, given his experience) the level to which he delivered.

Words: Ali Glen

Photos: Dan Brock