The Commoners – Live in Leeds 2025 – “hard-rocking machine”

Brudenell Social Club, Leeds 10^th December 2025

That’s three visits to Leeds in two years, once as a support act, twice as a headliner – could The Commoners be the hardest working band around? They certainly put the effort in onstage and their constant gigging has polished their playing to a hard-rocking machine.

Even tonight, when their front man,Chris Medhurst, is feeling really rough, he still works hard and the band are so amazingly together that when he dashes off stage three times in the evening, they keep playing and cover his place with extended interplay. Apart from momentary confusion for the audience (“was it something we said?”), there’s no gap in the flow. And it’s a great flow; a full set of old and new (the band’s only a few years old), fast and slow. The impassioned ballads see Chris winding himself around and emoting; the fast ones see him wailing loud and stamping his feet.

The sound is a pure Southern Rock meets West Coast hard rock sound of the Seventies. Yet this is a Canadian band of the Twenty-Twenties and they are grooving hard and naturally in their own way. The sound is beautifully integrated and the band make a point of throwing some shapes and paying attention to each other, giving us a show. Yet, individually, there isn’t a weak link and focus on any one part of the band brings pleasure (the ever-great Brudenell sound makes this easy). Lead guitar from Ross Citrullo is melodic and firm. His solos tend to the pentatonic but are always nicely judged. Ben Spiller plays a relaxed and groovy bass, while Miles Evan Branagh has a range of keyboard sounds, with the Hammond sound fitting in particularly nicely. Adam Cannon’s drums are punchy, full and powerful. Chris Medhurst, as I said, is a visual centrepiece as well as a surprisingly powerful vocalist, even when barely standing.

Tonight was not quite at the full strength of the band, thanks to illness but it showed the astonishing tightness and resource of the unit as they pulled together to put on the best show they could. This is a band that could happily fill any size venue with sound and feeling – they just need word to get out and that reputation to keep growing.