The Noise Coming From Philippe
I’m never a big fan of the support act. There’s no prejudice there. It’s just from my experience I’ve rarely been lucky enough to see one that made me change my mind on that opinion. Then again, I’m not the biggest fan of live music anyway, particularly if I’m not a big fan of the band. If I like a few of their songs, even if I love a few of their songs, then I’m happy going to see a band. But I know there will be moments of pondering and gazing around the room, and not being wholly drawn in. That’s the times when I most feel like I’ve snuck into a secret society meeting and no one knows I’m not a fully paid-up, card-carrying member of their society.
This week I went to see Tom Smith, lead singer of the band Editors, in concert at Union Chapel in Islington. Having heard his solo album I was very much looking forward to a melancholy evening of gazing down from the balcony, taking in a wide view of the amazing space that is Union Chapel, and feeling the music. No sing-a-longs. No moshing. No chanting like we’re at a football match. My natural state, my often-preferred state, is being awed by something. Put me in front of Niagara Falls and I look on in awe. I don’t jump up and down like a lunatic and get excited. That’s my pace. Tom Smith had joked before the gig and he joked during the gig that it was nice to sit around with us all and play miserable music. That’s the sort of mood I was ready for. I wasn’t really ready for Philippe Nash.
It’s fair to say that I felt the music long before I could identify any of the lyrics. The one thing you can’t teach is how to be mesmerizing. There is no school of mesmerizing. I immediately think of Pixies and Nirvana and the slow-quick-soft-loud sound of that era of Grunge. I know I’m drawn in by the noises coming from Philippe. It’s not just the sound of his guitar or the sound of Simon Bower on the cello, a sound that can only be described as rock-cello. I never knew you could play cello like a distorted guitar. It’s both those things and it was the noise coming from Philippe himself. I’m not just talking about the power of his voice, or the diversity. You can’t help but feel the gear shifts from Damien Rice, to Thom Yorke to Kurt Cobain. Intimacy and intensity sit right next to each other and it feels like an intimate scream in my ear. What will always win me over is a singer who just makes extraordinary noises. As examples, most of Hey Jude, particularly the screaming sounds from John towards the end. "Map of your head" by Muse, in which Matt Bellamy goes total, "Screaming cat." My favourite Blur thing ever is in Country House where you get a lot out of Damon Albarn going "Ooh-la-la-la." It’s the most expressive line in the whole song. This goes beyond singing a song. This is more than performing a song. This is a song bursting out of the singer. It is expressive beyond words. There’s more truth in some noises than there is in others’ words.
Go to any indie-rock-and-roll gig and you always see a certain demographic. It’s a sea of grey and white, of middle-aged folk who have a sense of loyalty to a band, a sense of identity too. They will own the new album and learned the lyrics already. They will know every word to all of the back catalogue. This night was no different. Maybe it was the acoustic element of Tom Smith’s set that had no one prepared for jumping about or whooping it up. I don’t think there was even some casual swaying when Philippe was playing. There was applause and appreciation but if anyone else was wowed they did not share it with me. It led to the most curious atmosphere. Philippe remained seated throughout the set. God knows how intense he might get if he stood up. But I don’t want him to. There’s something about being tightly wrapped like a coil sat in a seat, almost hugging a guitar and all that energy goes into the song. All that energy, all that tension and intensity hit the audience in the face and I’m not sure they knew what to do about it.
Who goes to a gig for the support band anyway? Perhaps everyone was at the bar. In an alternate reality I went to the bar. I can’t say what it felt like for others. It felt like a muted response from the audience, those there waiting for the main act, those that got there early to nab the best pews. The intimacy and intensity combined with a muted reception of the songs made me feel like I had a private concert. I should have turned to others and said “Are you actually hearing this too?” I felt how I feel when I listen to music on headphones. The second to last song actually made me shiver. I had a physical reaction to the song.
As I listened, happily mesmerized and in comfortable awe, I thought “How can you have this voice and not be known?” Then again, Alexi Murdoch is a favourite of mine and despite his music being used in multiple films and TV shows, I bet there’s a lot of people that have never heard of him. At least you can find him online though. Search for Philippe Nash and you don’t come up with much, and he’s been doing this for a fair few years now. I wouldn’t be surprised if you Googled him and the first thing you read was this article. You’ll also find video clips of a live performance at Clapham Books. It looks like they’ve snuck into a corner of the shop and decided to play. And again, there’s a scenario where his sound is met with silence and the music is given a place to reverberate. I’m almost at a point of thinking, if a unique but familiar sound of an artist squeezing his creativity out of himself in the form of incredible sounds happens in a forest and no one hears it, does it really make any sound?
After his set at Union Chapel, he said he’d be selling merch at the back of the room. I wasn’t sure if that meant he’d be selling it himself, as in, standing behind a table exchanging goods for money, or if he just meant his merch would be on sale. I saw a couple of T-Shirts I really liked. The one with a cartoon heart ripping itself in half, the wording on the T-Shirt being Eternal Heartbreak had to be bought. There was, however, no one there to sell it to me. I asked and was told that “he’ll be here soon.”
Having watched the set from the balcony, the view afforded to me was of a guy with dyed blonde hair, wearing shades and looking a bit cyberpunk for it. I had no trouble spotting him when he arrived. He seemed surprised that someone was waiting around to buy a T-shirt. I had no fear of sounding like a gushing fanboy. I told him exactly what I was thinking. I told him he was great out there. I told him that the second to last song gave me shivers. And he seemed genuinely happy in a way I can never imagine a writer being when told about how someone felt about their writing. Equally, I can’t imagine anyone telling a writer how great their work is. You read it. You like it. You move on. There is no performance and no immediate reaction. No one cheers or whoops on the writer or comes up to them after they’ve finished doing what they do and tells them how great their writing is. Music automatically elicits a response.
Strip away an easy-to-find internet presence or a well-marketed and easily defined type of musician, regardless of whether he plays in a book shop or in support of a bigger name act, this is an artist. In the silence after the songs, it’s still all about the music.