Kiran Leonard + Special Guests

Kiran Leonard’s unique and ambitious body of work spans more than a decade of releases on

labels such as Moshi Moshi and Hand of Glory, limited-run noisy DIY fare, and everything in

between. The adolescent guitar/chamber prog of early records such as ‘Bowler Hat Soup’

(2013) and ‘Grapefruit’ (2016) earned praise from Pitchfork, the Guardian and the Quietus, and

produced several BBC 6Music-playlisted singles. More recent work has seen Kiran attempt to

synthesise interests in situated/home recording, collage, his live practice, and a combination of

songcraft with graphic scores, as documented on the monumental (i.e. two-hour-long) and

abstract ‘Trespass on Foot’ (2021) and ‘River Holds Peace, Some Live’ (2023), a collection of

new and old material arranged for an ensemble of multiple electric guitars, cittern and double

bass.

Returning after half a decade of songs without choruses at the ripe old age of 28, Kiran released

his new album ‘Real Home’ on Memorials of Distinction this past April, which was named by the

Guardian among the best albums of 2024 so far. Preceded by two singles, ‘Treat Me a Stranger’

(a 44-second country-tinged ode to domesticity and the Singing Brakeman himself, Jimmie

Rodgers) and ‘My Love, Let’s Take the Stage Tonight’ (a more standard-length three-minute

quote “guitar pop banger”), ‘Real Home’ is the most concise and well-honed summary so far of

his multivalent oeuvre (in other words, it’s his best!) Following a sold-out show at Windmill

Brixton in early March and a headline tour in May — whose Glasgow date earned a five-star

review in the Skinny — he will head out once again to a handful of basements and function

rooms with a new band featuring members of caroline, Shovel Dance Collective, and Historically

Fucked.

PRAISE FOR “REAL HOME” AND LIVE SHOWS

“Leonard rather pre-empted a swathe of other British artists playing his kind of theatrical

chamber-pop (Black Country, New Road; caroline; Blue Bendy, etc), and the timbre and

direction of his voice, flitting from perch to perch, remains unforgettably gorgeous. Real Home is

one of his most easily lovable LPs, full of beautiful string arrangements and stirring dynamics,

but there’s nothing ordinary about the directions his songs take.” - The Guardian (The best

albums of 2024 so far)

“There's always a sense that a deluge of emotion and noise is right around the corner, the

unabashed romanticism of 'My Love, Let's Take The Stage Tonight' or a disorienting decay into

abstracted noise that closes the final song 'He Had Always Led'. Inspired by the Greater

Manchester-born musician's move to London, it captures the city's great overwhelm in all its

beguiling brilliance, volatility, fitfulness and flux.” - The Quietus

“An album of dizzying detail, delivered in a manner more open and accessible than pretty much

anything in Leonard’s excellent back catalogue. It is spiky and literate and humane, and

although it navigates some extraordinarily varied terrain, it never strays too far from its theme or

from its ultimately melodic musical core. Real Home is an object lesson in combining

experimental substance with accessible style.” - KLOF Mag on ‘Real Home’

“Kiran Leonard and his band nail down their place as one of the best live bands around. His new

record Real Home is the best thing I've heard all year...good God, him and his band are

incredible tonight...The sound has the dexterity and angular playing of math-rock but is so much

more loose and ragged, with a swooning Dirty Three romanticism at its core. Leonard himself is

a livewire presence at the centre of it all, gnashing, wide-eyed, totally consumed by the song.

He has this propensity for wrenching his body and face with every syllable, as if every line is

being torn from the very centre of him...One can only hope this new immediacy means his work

finally gets its dues at a broader level. Whether it does or it doesn’t, Leonard remains a class

apart in the British music scene, and his band one of the best you could hope to see.” - *****

The Skinny (live review)