Tuesday 30 September 2014
David Thomas Broughton
Last week, in a tiny subterranean bar, I
attended my third David Thomas Broughton
concert in five years. It was by turns funny,
scary, touching, confrontational and
beautiful, but above all it was, as always, a
unique experience. Part singer-songwriter,
part performance artist, Broughton treats his
songs as raw material, to be dissected and
reassembled at will, looping his voice, his
guitar and various electronic gizmos, while
incorporating any inanimate objects that come
to hand. He wanders off mic and off stage,
singing on the move, in the middle of the
audience, even from half way up the staircase
leading out of the venue.
Broughton's sonorous baritone (think a 21st
Century Jake Thackray) is currently
complemented by The Juice Vocal Ensemble, with
whom he has recorded one of 2014's finest
albums, 'Sliding The Same Way'. Over Juice's
often unsettling, aural backdrop, Broughton's
clipped Northern diction tackles dark themes
on the LP, sometimes using very blunt
language. 'I will glass every one of you
pricks in this bar', isn't a line you'll find
anywhere in the Folk tradition and was
delivered with such mesmeric conviction
during last week's concert, that I'm sure I
wasn't alone in shifting uncomfortably in my
seat. An essential album and an essential
live performer.
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3 comments:
On first listen, I'm deeply intrigued. Just when I thought I couldn't be arsed to even seek out any 'new' music I find that there is something like a 21st Century Jake Thackray, which is exactly what we need. Will definitely make further enquiries.
Yes I just loved that track....which opens a whole can of worms...like SB I am intrigued...spotify here I come.
He has a Bandcamp page with a ton of streamable stuff on it, but not the new album yet.
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