It always comes back to the man and his acoustic guitar. Book-ending tonight’s performance with fragility, he ends much as he began, only more so. He stood alone at the start line – no fanfare, no formalities – with the self-depreciating humour and purring French of b-side ‘The Professor / La Fille Danse’, and ends without amplification, perched at the lip of the vast stage, serenading a silent, rapt audience (even if such a direct connection is probably at best imagined) with a solemn, flawless ‘Cannonball’. It’s an often-executed feature of his live shows, but one that never fails to summon an auditorium full of lumps to the back of throats. Both serve to illustrate his unchallenged strength as laureate of broken relationships and buried emotions, and the remarkable range he is capable of achieving with such simple tools. It is also his public face, the mainstream-endorsed visage, and two rare times he indulges those expectations straight-up tonight. It’s almost like they were propped at either end to shield the rest of the set, the hard centre, from undeserving ears.
But it is certainly not only the man and his guitar.  Damien Rice is not what most presume him to be. But then it’s hard to work out what exactly he is or wants you to consider him to be. Not least because what he reaffirmed himself as with comparatively routine sophomore album ‘9’ is apparently the converse of his desire. He has, since he started touring his peerless debut ‘O’, developed a penchant for unfolding creative anagrams of his songs, tearing them at the seams, striking a match to them, finding any which way to see and make them seen differently. It is what’s made him a captivating performer, rather than just a man who plays his celebrated songs in public. And tonight – in opposition to the presumptions ‘9’ encouraged – is no different, with barely a song appearing quite like it does in recorded form. It’s evolution, in progress.
One of his best known songs ‘Volcano’ is rolled out early and dragged through the wringer, morphing through a virile, percussive carnival intro, out of which the recognisable melody gradually shuffles, into an up-tempo piano-led body and bulging, distorted climax. ‘Rootless Tree’ sheds the ill-fitting saccharine angst of the album version for a skeletal reading alone at the piano where the true, tormented soul of the song is finally laid beautifully bare, ‘Coconut Skins’ is the same enjoyable skit but with additional rousing ivory pounding and ‘I Remember’ is extended as ever but braves yet more virgin territory, bridging into a progressive space-jazz jam for untold absorbing minutes. ‘Eskimo’, delivered from a tight crouched position conducting his effects pedals, remains faithful to its template but mines much deeper emotions than a CD is capable of containing, pirouetting elegantly into expansive realms more commonly patrolled by Sigur Ros and their rare ilk. And yet, in spite of the myriad distractions, the focus stays with the man and his guitar. Tonight, especially, there is the draw of a raw flame inside him that we don’t recall experiencing before. And tonight, especially, he is alone. Tonight’s performance is the first UK date since faerie-waif Lisa Hannigan’s sudden, guarded departure from his band; she who is as synonymous with the name Damien Rice as the man himself, she who’s unbelievable ethereal tones were the first thing many heard and the perfect foil to his shadowy contemplations. Of course it can only be speculation, but the feeling that he’s out to prove himself, his name, the authenticity of his muse, is hard to ignore. He is on hold-your-breath form, a slave to the music as much as the music is to him, doing only what feels right (he aborts ‘Dogs’ moments in because it doesn’t), even when that means barely touching the album he’s meant to be promoting. It doesn’t matter. It’s complex. But then, when it’s really no more complicated than a man and his guitar, how can it be? Relevant sites:
www.damienrice.com
James Berry for Crud Magazine 2006© |
