“This could be an epicentre for an explosion of love.”
Live shows are hard to come by these days. So, too, are ‘explosions of love’. Yet, suffice to say, both magically occurred recently one Sunday night at London’s stoic Barbican Centre.
Hosted by the multi-faceted, multi-talented folk singer-songwriter Richard Dawson, this was to be the farthest thing from any ordinary Sunday night - The Barbican basked in soft lighting with a cavernous reverberating effect, which hosted a single musician on-stage spanning his ten year-discography. Nervously confiding that the first 45 minutes would be “rusty” and the next 45 minutes would be “alright”, Dawson imminently masked this discomfort with his signature jolting rhythms, grounding distortions, vocal versatility and lyrical pertinence birthed from his latest LP, 2020.
Airy, falsetto commentaries within ‘Civil Servant’ eventually transcended into incandescent screams of “I refuse, refuse, refuse” before giving way to the rather unorthodox folkloric description of a father and son viewing a football match. Whilst Dawson’s lyrical themes and content may have proved erratic to some, the descriptive and detailed eye in which he confidently painted proved surreal. Depicting such middle-age banality in the former, and setting the mildly-humorous football scene in the latter, thereafter concluding with a fortress of sound caked within ‘The Queen’s Head’, Dawson unflappably careened through a myriad of personal, scenic routes.
Sitting through this performance, as well as listening to Dawson over the years, the act of pinpointing his musical identities and influences still passes me by. Tonight proved no exception as we heard vague vignettes into pieces of Captain Beefheart, along with a sweetly softened touch to Tom Waits’ ‘Fish & Bird’. Ascertained from various corners of the internet, Dawson has leaned toward pop-virtuoso Björk and jazz pioneer Sun Ra as potential candidates for musical aspirations - yet the unflinching folkloric veneer structuring much of tonight’s set stood firm above all else.
“I’m just worried about your minds...”
For some, this statement may have been applicable. Particularly when Dawson initiated a transportation back to the 15th century, by way of a handful of a cappella recitals of ‘The Felon’s Song’, ‘Joe the Quilt-Maker’ and ‘The Ghost of a Tree’. Offering a unique sense of folkloric and neatly poetic tales, Dawson utilised the venue as best he could - pausing for breath, incessantly stomping his foot - vehemently fuelling his own environment to wilfully whisk us away from the tribulations of this year. Whilst the concluding crescendo burgeoning the latter track was palpably gut-wrenching in its incessant semitonal shifts, the audience departed from this show unashamedly full on the eclectic gluttony of Dawson’s repertoire.
This ultimately brought our highly unusual Sunday evening to an end. Come to think of it, it was unusual in every way possible: grounded in London’s Barbican; offering my first show in 268 days; performed by a shaggy-haired artist reciting 500-year old tales. Whilst the broad range of Dawson’s entourage were sorely missed this evening, this artist ultimately proved himself as one of the most undervalued folk musicians of late. The true literary authorship of Dawson prompted us to let our hair down one final time before a looming lockdown on the capital, basking in a true, 15th-century inspired ‘explosion of love’.
7/10
Richard Dawson's latest LP, 2020, is out now and can be found here.
All photos are courtesy of Mark Allan whose work can be found here.
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