Music

3 Singer-Songwriters at EartH

Tickets to gigs in London tend to be sold out months in advance (even if attendance varies a lot for "sold out" shows) so typically when you go to a show I find myself quite disconnected to the reasons why I bought the ticket. Over the last couple of weeks I've ended up at Hackney's EartH three times, each time to see a solo singer songwriter perform.

So I ended up seeing in quick succession Nina Nastasia, Owen Pallet and Waxahatchee (aka Katie Crutchfield who was performing solo).

All three were lost in the huge space, something that Nastasia and Pallet both openly acknowledged but the sound was great for all three and the audience respectful of the soft, acoustic music. EartH is generally a pretty great venue in my experience.

Nastasia and Crutchfield had essentially the same setup of a guitar, a microphone and a couple of monitors. Pallet had a much more elaborate arrangement with a loopbank, violin and guitar. For many of his songs he accompanied himself via the looper and often finished songs with a decayed version of the main loop. He often used a plucked violin to create the basic parts of the songs which reminded me a lot of Andrew Bird.

Pallet had a wide ranging set on his first live tour in a while but he opened with This Lamb Sells Condos which I love and which had an interesting translation into a solo version. Nastasia has the brilliant new album Riderless Horse so tracks from that predominated and was even more emotional and electrifying live I think. The backstory to the songs is pretty potent.

I don't really know the music of Waxahatchee at all (although that put me in a minority of the audience) and she was trying out new material that is intended for a future album. Of the three her voice was definitely the most powerful, ranging and clear although Nastasia gripped with pure emotion that felt like something more than pure performance.

Between songs Nastasia was surprisingly cheery, bantering about her aggressive dog, touring and the venue. Pallet was charming and witty but also indicated that he really wanted to power through the set and do as much music as possible. Crutchfield told a few anecdotes but was definitely the most reserved performer despite having the largest audience who were very much there for her.

I felt Pallet's performance flew by but both Nastasia and Crutchfield had moments where my attention wandered sometimes as they were retuning and sometimes when I didn't really feel the songs.

All had a similar story of returning to touring after a COVID-related break and all felt as if they had come back enthused by the prospect of playing to life audiences again.

It's odd how things work out sometimes but I feel lucky to have seen such a succession of great performances in quick succession.

April's music round up

This month is shaping up to be a great one for new single releases so I thought I'd make a few notes on what has caught my ear. The Big Moon and Daughter both released debut albums that I liked a lot, second albums that I didn't enjoy as much and now have new albums out that are being promoted by singles that I quite like and which feel like a return to the music elements that I enjoyed in the first place.

The Big Moon's 2 Lines (a live version linked) has the dynamism that was downplayed for the second album Walking like we do. I particularly like the staccato vocal line in the pre-chorus and while the chorus lyrics are a bit trite they are delivered in a heartfelt way.

Daughter's To Rage is absolutely in the shoegaze/4AD arena which is absolutely my bag but the lyrics remain poetic and the guitar melodies are lovely. The anger of the lyrics is also an interesting counterpoint to the dream pop like delivery.

I know Art School Girlfriend as guitar-based indie singer-songwriter so I did not expect the dance driving sound of new release Close to Clouds although the vocals remain drifting and the lyrics regretful. I feel I can just listen to this one on repeat.

English Teacher's Song about Love starts with a motorik like post-punk coldness and ironic knowing lyrics but dissolves into a more psychedelic emotional crescendo in a mirror of its slippery topic. The song feels familiar but new in the way that popular music should.

A great start to Spring!

Landsraad

I've been exploring the dungeonsynth genre recently (more to come on that). Landsraad are a bit adjacent to that scene as their influence are the Dune novels rather than fantasy but I picked up their album The Golden Path on Bandcamp Friday and really enjoyed the sound of it. Initially I thought it was quite 80s, in the vein of Vangelis but it's actually quite modern in terms of the synth sound and the layers that make up the tracks.

Dr. Phibes and the House of Wax Equations

I was listening to 6Music when I locked into a particular track that was playing. Psychedelic with a strong Hendrix influence, I immediately thought that it was a Britpop revival tune in that it clearly had one foot in the Sixties and the other in modern production. I was curious as to who was doing this and whether it was part of any wider movement.

The answer was much more simple as it was Hazy Lazy Hologram, a part of Britpop that passed me by. The gauzy shoegaze textures, the Primal Scream danceable rock and the Hendrix element all made sense.

Of course as a result I can't tell whether this is something I like or something that is timeless and bridges musical eras.