Leeds’ all-dayer High and Lonesome is a festival dedicated to the sad fuck in all of us, aptly placed within that unsweet spot where winter darkness and bitter cold start to really grind.

This year’s edition fell on 25 November.

Now in its fourth year, High and Lonesome 2017 was this time held solely at inner-city indie mainstay, Brudenell Social Club – a venue where nobody bats an eyelid when you ask for a steaming cup of tea to sup at whilst watching a show.

This day-long festival boasted headliners The Travelling Band, Josh Rouse, as well as Keston Cobblers Club (the antithesis of sad), Gill Landry, Pale Seas and many more.

NEN was, of course, along for the ride, after last year reigned true as one of the best small festivals of 2016. Was 2017 to live up to it?

Here are our top picks from this year’s High and Lonesome festival:

Christof

Ambiguous in name, Bear’s Den member touring member Christof van der Ven’s mid-afternoon set captivated the festival, still very much warming up. High and Lonesome totes itself as ‘a festival of modern songwriting’, which as cliché as it sounds, is exactly what is it. Christof’s beguiling set was a sweet, soft affair referencing folk counterparts such as The Staves and First Aid Kit, with bursts of anthemic fusion when the track called for an alt-indie turn, but not without reason.

Brooke Bentham

Raw and emotive is what Brooke Bentham purveys, with hint of surf, and well too. Not so many artists pen their internal monologue so well, so directly as Brooke (or project them so well), and her driving set brimmed with melancholy as High and Lonesome busied.

North Shields’ answer to SOAK, catch Brooke whilst she’s still playing smaller venues on the back of her recent EP release, whilst you can get close enough to feel her fire.

Shadowlark

Our festival highlight and Leeds band, Shadowlark, brought an ethereal air to proceedings with a dimly-lit stage. A dodgy amp attempted to ruin their swirling electro-indie set but it was not to be.

The band peaked early with famed ‘Control’, and Frontwoman Ellen Smith teased her way through the set with gossamer-light vocals, and a natural reference to the Brudenell’s ‘nice pies and stuff’, before playing through “another cheery one”, ‘Bleed My Heart’.

John Smith

“Listen if this doesn’t bring you down, nothing will,” John Smith proclaims, towards the middle of his set. There was something different about the audience for John Smith in the venue’s main area, and it felt like we were missing some kind of sad bastard music trade secret. John Smith opened to a pindrop-quiet room and like some kind of church for the forlorn, he held court through Living In Disgrace, Axe Mountain, Headlong and more, sometimes with full accompaniment. Sometimes with the sound of his own naked guitar (sans plectrum).

“Do you like murder, or heartbreak?” If you’re into Josh T. Pearson’s dark americana, and not into John Smith yet, you know what to do.

Josh Rouse

Josh Rouse is a fair sight on these shores, especially northern ones. The bare thought of hearing ‘Flight Attendant’ live had us piqued, and it seemed, most of the other festivalgoers too. After a day of room-to-room scheduling cleverly pitched by High and Lonesome to ensure you could see Every Single Band should you wish to, we found ourselves trawling to this penultimate act to arrive at a solid base of fans camping out at the front, the crowd already gathering before John Smith had finished in anticipation. They harmonised and sang along from the off as Josh teased them into the choruses of his new material for an album out in 2018, including recent teaser ‘Love in the Modern Age’. He then took to older tracks, including 2010’s ‘I Will Live On Islands’ after a segue on his living in Spain and returning to the US, and ‘Happiness Waltz’. And then it came…’Flight Attendant’. BUT DO YOU NEED TO WHISTLE THE CHORUS ALREADY?

It was a pleasant and twee set rich in Josh’s infinite joviality, that delivered exactly what his fans desired, and the promise of returning to the UK for more next year.

For more information on Leeds promoters High and Lonesome, and next year’s festival (we’re hoping for one), head to www.highandlonesome.co.uk.