English Teacher at Roundhouse

26^th November 2025

Sarah Bradbury

Shot by Nick Bennett

Sarah Bradbury Shot by Nick Bennett

26 November 2025

Is there anything more appealing when the nights are closing in and there’s a chill in the air, to huddle with your fellow Londoners in a darkened space to listen to some truly transporting music? And where better to enjoy such sounds than the acoustically perfected surrounds of Camden’s iconic Roundhouse?

On this brisk Tuesday evening, after a suitably ambience-warming set by fellow indie-rock Yorkshire musicians, the Orielles, it was time for Leeds-hailing outfit English Teacher to take to the multicolour-lit stage. Fresh off their BRIT nomination and win of the much-coveted Mercury Music Prize last year for This Could Be Texas, the band have gone from strength to strength, a mainstay of the just-left-of-centre alternative music scene, beloved by the likes of BBC Radio 6 Music.

Frontwoman Lily Fontaine moved seamlessly from up front with the mic to behind the keyboard to lead her group (Lewis Whiting, Douglas Frost and Nicholas Eden, plus Blossom Caldarone on the cello) in a smattering of their contemporary, punk-meets-poetry take on guitar music, her husky vocals that lean right into her Northern twang oscillating between soaring, long-held notes and witty, biting spoken words.

Clear highlights were bombshell first single R&B, featuring an addictive dirty bass guitar riff that crescendos into a full rock-out by the song’s climax, and Fontaine ruminating on her place within the white-male-heavy world of indie rock as a mixed-race woman, (“Despite appearances, I haven’t got the voice for R&B”), Mastermind Specialism, both lyrically and sonically recalling a twisted nursery lullaby, each line tumbling into the next like the gentlest of waterfalls trickling down your spine (“Hmm, tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor / Hmm, singer, porn star, writer, thief”), plus killer track The World’s Biggest Paving Slab, which encapsulates the ET sound most aptly, Fontaine’s vocals reverberating on the chorus, then cutting to her edgy spoken lines, “I am the world’s biggest paving slab / So watch your f*cking feet”.

Between numbers, which also included Broken Biscuits, I’m Not Crying, You’re Crying, and Nearly Daffodils, it was all effortless down-to-earth chitchat, pointing out their first headline gig three years ago was just across the road, and they hope to see us next at… “What’s that big one called? Ally Pally? Or the O2?!” – at the rate they’re going, a likely occurrence.

After exiting the stage, the band returned for the obligatory encore, treating the audience to 2022’s Polyawkward and A55 before sending us off, floating into the night in a dreamlike state, the simultaneously charming and edgy, quirky and beautiful, avant-garde and relatable sounds and words of English Teacher replaying wistfully in our minds. If you ever wondered if indie rock could stray away from pale, male and stale, here’s your fiercely original, no bullsh*t answer. This is music to make you slyly smirk while also stirring your soul.

Sarah Bradbury
Photos: Nick Bennett

For further information and future events, visit English Teacher’s website here.

Watch the video for English Teacher – Mastermind Specialism here: