Nieve Ella and Bradley Simpson shine in Birmingham
Check out our full gallery HERE!
Nieve Ella is an upcoming pop artist from Albrighton, East Shropshire. In 2023, Ella made her big break and has now been on her own headline tour, supported people like Blossoms and will even be playing BludFest in 2025.
In May 2025, Ella embarked on tour with 2010’s heartthrob Bradley Simpson on his second headline tour ‘The Panic Years Tour’ after releasing a duvet of Simpsons fan favourite song ‘Favourite Band’ (in which she joined Brad on stage during the show). As Nieve Ella was only the support, her set was 8 songs long lasting around 30-45 minutes, her short set was acoustic consisting of slow melodic songs that her dedicated fans interacted with.
For this acoustic set, Ella took stage by herself and was accompanied by her guitarist Fin Marlow announcing that on the final show of the tour in London, she would have the rest of the band. Ella and Marlow often dueted throughout the show, Ella taking lead vocals and Marlow harmonising with her creating a soft and gentle atmosphere within the venue.
Nearing the end of her set Nieve got her fans involved, teaching them lyrics and asking them to sing and clap along during the final few songs to make the crowd feel welcome and ready for Bradley Simpson to take the stage.
—
Bradley William Simpson was a major heartthrob back in the early 2010’s when he started the band The Vamps with co-founder James Mcvey. 11 years later Simpson has now released his own solo album and is currently on tour touring the album. Simpson has a very loyal and dedicated fan base, queuing up hours before his show/s in order to get barricade to enjoy the show from the best possible spot.
During Simpson's 3rd song which was his first single ‘Cry at the Moon’ fans clapped along, encouraging the artist with each move that he made and again they clapped and cheered when he introduced his band Eleanor on drums and James on guitar.
From observation of attending Simpson's previous tour, I noticed that Bradley Simpson kept the strong red and blue lighting that coated him in a silhouette with the occasional flash of amber / white blinders that were covered by a sheet to soften the effect the lights had and so they didn’t fully blind the crowd. The blinders would light Simpson up for a split second before dying down back into the strong primary colours.
During the 5th song of the singers set ‘Not Us Anymore’ his dedicated fan base went wild for the guitar solo Simpson performed, throwing himself energetically around the stage as he performed for the 100’s of fans who had gone out to see him that evening, before slowing it down slightly to ‘Favourite Band’ which he dueted with Nieve Ella since the new feature release of the song.
During the middle portion of his set, Simpson decided to slow down the tempo of the songs and asked his fans to raise their phone lights during ‘Holy Grail’ to accompany this, he used the same silhouette lighting on the stage that he used in the early part of his set. To keep with the intimate feel of the show, Simpson moved into the centre of the crowd, no microphone or anything to sing the slowest and saddest song on the album ‘The Bands Not Breaking Up’, the fans were asked to keep quiet until the final chorus when the crowd joined in with Simpson building the welcoming atmosphere.
As a special part of this tour Simpson would sing a song by an artist from each city he performed in, however, I was quite disappointed when he sang ‘505’ by Arctic Monkeys rather than a song by an artist who is from Birmingham. However, when I think about it, Simpsons favourite artist is the Arctic Monkeys so I wondered if he sang a song by his favourite artist in his hometown instead of singing a song by an artist in his hometown.
Bradley Simpson opened up to his audience about the reasoning behind his song ‘Panic Years’. He expressed how he has written about the past 10 years of his life and how he felt panicked and confused about what's to come. He explained how he wanted his fans who listen to it to know that everything will be fine and okay in the end.
Simpson has always valued the shows he’s performed both in a band and as a solo artist, he enjoys ensuring everyone is having a blast, in multiple songs ‘Always Like This’ and ‘Daisies’ he asked the crowd to put their phones away, and go crazy, waving their arms in time with each other, getting on each others shoulders and getting down to then jump up and go absolutely crazy. He split the crowd down the middle during ‘Daisies’ to have a sound competition between the crowd (he never chose a winner but he did say it was the best time yet!). Simpson knows how to drive his fans insane, using his ‘OW’ catch phrase to gather the crowd's attention before showing off his custom vest that read ‘Birmingham’ across the back and making some crude remark about ‘Magic Mikes down the road’ before announcing there is new music in the works.
Coming to the end of his set, Simpson ended with fan favourite song ‘Carpet Burn’ the spotify video being filled with videos of fans singing along to the song. The song has a sad meaning but is upbeat creating the perfect atmosphere to ending the show.