After being binned by the scary-mess Hope & Glory Festival, Charlotte Church proved she won’t be kept from having fun. Jack Cinnamond ran from Hope & Glory to catch a blast of fun at Liquidation at EBGBs.

I’m not going to preach you on how woeful and dangerous Hope & Glory Festival was on opening day (yet) but I will explain that after hours delay between bands and curfew reaching quicker, organisers cancelled Charlotte Church’s Late Night Pop Dungeon without even telling us. 

Charlotte Church instead brought her Late Night Pop Dungeon specially to the weekly Liquidation club night at the ever-wonderful EBGBs as a special, last minute treat free to those with festival wristbands or simply £3 on the door. 

Which for a band who light the festival scene on fire over the last few years and have destroyed headline shows at the likes of Manchester‘s Gorilla and London‘s Roundhouse, it’s a treat to catch them at a place like EBGBs and in a dungeon-like biker bar-esque location like EBGBs, it’s very fitting. 

For their set, Charlotte Church’s Late Night Pop Dungeon pulled out an array of pop and rock classics that just melted and collided perfectly to create a pure party atmosphere, and it works so well. From their slamming version of Black Sabbath‘s “War Pigs” to their collision of Rock Master Scott & the Dynamic Three‘s “Roof Is On Fire” and the classic Talking Heads track “Burning Down The House“. 

Church shows not only is she a true pop-star, but that her knowledge of perfect pop bangers are almost magician like, with sections like playing “Vitimin C” by CAN to song-ending snippets of rock classics like “21st Century Schizoid Man” by King Crimson and even slick versions of the likes of The Beatles‘ “Lady Madonna“. 

Charlotte Church proves she’s not playing about now, she’s had her turn in the pop-industry machine and now wants to play it her way. In the end, Charlotte Fucking Church as fans yell joyously, stands tall. 

Neared the finish, we catch a perfect mash-up mainstay from her set, Destiny’s Child‘s “Bootylicious” mixed with “Killing In The Name” by Rage Against The Machine, which unlike how it sounds, works very well and goes down like a storm. 

Words by Jack Cinnamond, photograph by Jess Sharpe.