The Chalk, Brighton

December 15

GARY Lightbody stood centre stage, eyes closed. Lost in the beauty of the songs. His strong, sensitive, yearning voice soared, accentuated by the pared down, complementary set-up of Snow Patrol, minus drums and bass.

The sell-out crowd of a few hundred lost with him during each of the band’s majestic, moving ballads. Songwriter Lightbody, a warm, witty, friendly, and self-effacing leader, thanked us for our sensitivity, adding: “It means a lot.”

Snow Patrol returned to Brighton at the Chalk, a new, intimate venue, after the “cheese” of performing in front of 4,500 at the Brighton Centre as part of their 25th anniversary tour just three weeks earlier.

They wanted to promote their latest album Reworked... 13 “re-imagined” numbers and three new ones including a from-the-heart-tear-inducing standout I Think of Home by Lightbody dedicated to his “extraordinary” grandmother – and “reward their most dedicated fans” on this Resident (Brighton) matinee “out store” show.

I limboed under scaffolding as I joined the snaking queue buffeted by the winds which stirred up rough waves by Brighton Palace Pier opposite. But I was blown away by Lightbody and his Irish-Scottish cooperative once inside.

The subtle “re-imaginings” of the likes of Chocolate and Run, two classics off the band’s breakthrough Final Straw album which led to more than 16 million sales of their collective work, gave each a greater delicacy.

As did the arrangement for Chasing Cars, the most played song on UK radio in the decade just two weeks from ending.

The largely thirty-something-and-then-some crowd, at the beckoning of the song’s composer, joined in as he urged us to sing “let’s waste time chasing cars” before twirling his right forefinger to urge the next line “around our heads”.

I quoted the line “I need your grace to remind me of my own”’ from the song in my book The King of White Hart Lane and Dens Park about football legend Alan Gilzean, reunited with the game after exile with the help of former Snow Patrol keyboardist Tom Simpson, a soccer fan. Lightbody and co certainly graced us with their presence as they bonded once more with Brighton.

Book-ended by Chocolate and Open Your Eyes, it was a relaxed but totally involving, emotional 40 minutes.