When Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly — or Sam Duckworth as he’s known to his mother — emerged in 2005, he seemed like a real breath of fresh air. He’d grown up listening to punk and hardcore bands, he was politically outspoken and he sang gritty, urban stories of life growing up in Britain. Best described as a more tuneful Billy Bragg, he attracted interest and fans from all over the place and looked set to be a shining star. But sadly, he fizzled out before he came to brightness. Though his debut album sold moderately well, the follow-up bombed and he was released by his record label. Now re-signed, he has returned with a new self-titled album and — judging by his set in the upstairs room of the Academy — is completed revitalised.

Whereas once he played live with nothing but a laptop and acoustic guitar, he’s now got a five-strong band and clearly wants to deliver a livelier stage show, bounding out to a track that Mark Ronson would be quite happy to claim. The set then builds slowly, with it looking initially as if early single I-Spy will be the gig’s highlight, with its arm-waving chorus getting the crowd in good voice. Duckworth flits between being an earnest troubadour and a laid back entertainer, sometimes he’s all rhetoric and political outrage, even giving pep talks about the rise of fascism in the UK and railing against big corporations on Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly, before switching to summery sing-a-longs with irresistibly catchy melodies like Call Me Ishmael and Could’ve Seen It All.

It doesn’t always work, with the reaction occasionally bemusement, but mostly jubilance. Duckworth ends, fittingly with a hybrid of what he does best. The Uprising is a trumpet driven pop song, lyrically inspired by an Oxfam protest.