Ben Leece with Left of the Dial
Ben Leece was in his local record store, an establishment he visits with the borderline-addict frequency of any great music tragic. The proprietor, Chris Dunn, was in his usual locale, behind the counter, losing patience with his iPhone. “No wonder the fuckin’ world’s exhausted!” roared Dunn. Leece suddenly had a title for his solo record: “From that moment this album was never going to be called anything else.”
No Wonder the World Is Exhausted is a songbook of deceptive depth and emotional scope. The former Delta Lions member spreads his wings as a deft and poetic lyricist of eagle eye and forked tongue, wry and perceptive in equal measure. It’s the work of a writer who wrote songs on his father’s Maton before he properly learned to play, an early teen in Kamilaroi country on a small farm in Quirindi, on the Liverpool Plains south of Tamworth.
"An impressive debut built on economical and emotive songwriting and delivered via one hell of a voice."
- The Music 4/5
"Applause for antipodean Americana"
- Americana UK 8/10
"BEN LEECE’s single ‘Villains’ is a beautiful song. Americana, or pop, it doesn’t matter, for it draws on many facets of honest musical construction that is always never to be denied."
- Come Here Floyd