Kate Tempest @ Rescue Rooms [17/02/1994]

As she takes a break during a whirlwind set, Kate Tempest tells the capacity crowd at Rescue Rooms that it took her 15 years of grafting to finally reach this momentous occasion – her very own headline tour.

With her beginnings firmly rooted in spoken word and poetry, Tempest chose to tread a new path with the 2014 release of her debut rap album, Everybody Down. The record was so well received, it was nominated for last year’s Mercury Prize.

But this isn’t your run-of-the-mill rap music decked out with superfluous beats and vacuous, clichéd lyrics. No, this is much more.

Tempest is a story-teller and tonight’s venue is her canvas, where she crafts tales of love and squalor. At times it’s pure vitriol as she spits ferociously over percussive tracks – baring her soul for all to see.

The bulk of Tempest’s songs see her challenge the status quo, from corporations to politics to war. In fact, you’d be forgiven in thinking she was the more considered sibling of a Sleaford Mod.

She segues between tracks from her LP, including standouts The Beigeness and Marshall Law. The former transports the crowd to the setting of a pretentious East London club where “everyone here has a hyphenated second name.”

There are intervals when she proselytises to the Nottingham audience – emphasising a need to nurture creativity which embraces the community. This is met with peals of applause.

Tempest bids farewell with a poem, and it’s at these a Capella moments when her fare is most endearing.

It may have taken fifteen years to get to this point, but Kate Tempest should now only be looking to the future – and it looks exciting.