On the epic centrepiece to English Teacher’s debut album, Lily Fontaine laments that not everybody gets to go to space. “You’re too busy here,” she points out. “How could you fit it in?” The Leeds four-piece certainly have had a hectic couple of years, with a burgeoning fanbase watching and listening to them refine their sound in real time, and now, at the end of it, their sprawling, stirring first full-length caps an hugely impressive rise for the group.

 The seeds of the band were sown in 2018, when Fontaine met the rest of the members at the Leeds Conservatoire, where they were all students. Lewis Whiting plays guitar, Nicholas Eden is on bass, and Douglas Frost drums; Fontaine, meanwhile, sings, alternates between guitar and piano, and pairs the group’s consistently adventurous compositions with lyrics at one aching and abstract, scored through with northern wit. Their roots are a key part of their identity, with Fontaine singing in a soft Lancashire accent that gives away her upbringing in Colne; later, Leeds would help to nurture the band’s ambitions through the kind of regional platforms (Music Leeds, BBC Introducing) that Fontaine has been an outspoken proponent of.