I went to see Swell Season recently, the lovely duo from the film Once!It was amazing! I wish I could have shared the evening with all my friends!
Made me so speechless. I had to digest the evening over the next couple of days.
Here are some words:
authentic, honest, raw, warm, 'old and favourite' (like an old hoody or slippers), woody, intimate, sharing, grateful.
When I bought the CD 'The Swell Season' after having seen Once, I got tired of it after a month or two, cos it was just too depressing. So I wasn't sure what to expect. But it was such a deeply loving atmosphere, seeing them live. It took away any depressing feelings.
The songs are about such broken relationships and personal trouble, but seeing Glen and Marketa singing together was exactly the opposite. You could feel the intimate trust between them, just in the way their voices and instruments were synched in every possible way! So contrasted to the brokenness of the songs.
Their voices were so nice together! They were so on the same page in their performance, you could tell they had known each other for years, just from how they sounded.
And Glen was the man. The first song was Say It To Me Now which he plays when busking in beginning of the film. And on the night he just walked to front of stage and started playing, no mics or anything. The same holey guitar from the film, too. So raw and powerful. But at the same time just humble.
Some songs he would say thanks two or three times, you could tell he really was grateful to be playing music for a living and that he acknowledged that as a gift.
Him and Marketa had chilled at Waiheke for the day and met a lady who I think works for Greenpeace and Marketa dedicated a song to her saying "I hope you recognise what a hero you have living here."
At one point of the evening Glen gave his violinist some time to play his own solo stuff. I thought this was beautiful. Glen didn't have to do that. And people paid to see the Swell Season, but he was just like "Thanks for coming, here's a friend of mine who loves music, too, and I think its beautiful. Have a listen."
Just cool to see music friends supporting each other in a humble way, even on world tours.
The most touching part of the night was when Glen got the audience to sing along (which sounded surprisingly good!) and this happened a couple of times, but at the end they played an old Irish song that was written in like the 1600s and was sung at wakes. It was written from the perspective of the dead, saying things like "I'm sorry for the things I've done wrong" "Thank you, my friends, for sticking by me." "I would raise a glass to you if I was alive" and the last refrain Glen got the audience to keep repeating. The last couple of times we repeated it Glen was like, "Again, again, without regrets, without shame. No guilt." And I was like "WHOA!" where did THAT come from?!
It was awesome. Like, I don't know what he believes about God or whatever, but to me it just showed he had an understanding of the human condition and it was just such an amazing thing to say, with no context just telling people to be free. It was really beautiful.
And so the song finished on Glen's cue as he bowed his head, as the audience sung the final lines. Which I think was really cool, to let us participate, and to let us even finish a song. We thought we were the guests, privileged to come see The Swell Season, but in those last few lines, he somehow shifted the focus and it wasn't even about a performance anymore, I don't think.
Then for the encore Marketa played The Hill and then Glen came back out and they played Falling Slowly. Then I think she played If You Want Me.
They played some tracks from their newest album which I still don't own, and hadn't heard anything from till I saw them live. I really liked Low Rising and I Have Loved You Wrong (for this one the last bit where its just singing was sooooo lovely).
A really great night! Wish you could have been there.
