Reviewing our own show...
A view inside the onstage brain.
From the moment we stepped onstage this show felt special. An electric vibe in the room punctuated by familiar faces who had turned out to support for a second or third time among the many new faces, some who’d travelled across the world to be there (we spoke to fans from as far afield as LA, New Jersey and Ohio).
Early nerves were fast replaced by feelings of ease, that confidence you have to be truly yourself among friends you’re sure will be forever rooting for you. Our set was long thought out, walking on to the building unnerving cacophony of ‘Mean World Syndrome (Intro)’ and starting the set with ‘Life Support’ exactly mirroring the start of the new album. To feed the energy in the room in the early moments we followed up with ‘Origins’. I once heard that Rod Stewart had said “Make sure you grab ‘em by the balls in the first song and don’t let go until you’re done with ‘em…” and it always stayed with me, as it will you. Forgive his wording it was a different time and they were metaphorical balls.
At this point it's time for a scene change and an opportunity to greet the audience, this gives me a chance to move over to the piano for ‘Awake’ and ‘This Kind Of Heavy’ TKOH being a song that is an emotional hit to my core every time. I always come out of performing it feeling a little dizzy, like I’ve just come to after a fainting. Note to self; pairing together a song about my own battles with seasonal depression followed by a song about coming to terms with losing my friend - a virtuosic drummer who gave everything to every performance - may not have been the best self care move. We’ve put some thought into what we want our fans to take from our shows over the years, referencing some of the artists we love and borrowing from what they do best. You might go to a Coldplay show to feel optimistic about the world and energised by the colours and lights, to a Bon Iver show for cinematic moods, deep feelings and moving melodic soundscapes & to a U2 show for the epic spectacle. We want Belle Mt. shows to be a trip, where it’s possible have moments of elation followed by epiphany, maybe you’ll even embrace some tears that have been waiting for the right moment to come. We’re about feeling it all but that means we’re signing up to go on that emotional ride right alongside you.
As Leonard Cohen’s voice bellowed through the PA system ending ‘Hydra’ “I think that everybody lives the life of the heart, and everybody knows what its like to er, to crack up, and I think we cherish that in our singers when they manifest that, those experiences in song” It’s almost like Cohen is speaking directly from the other side. I look up into the crowd to see lovers kissing & tears falling. This continues through ‘Feathers’; whichever end of the emotional spectrum, a room full of people truly in the moment.
We like to use the full dynamics available to us within a headline set and the next section of ‘Loving You’ & ‘Hold Me Love’ gradually strip it right back to the bare bones, the crowd join us singing ‘Loving You’, it never gets old to hear the words sung back to us. ‘The Ashes’ and ‘The Sun Swallows Us Whole’ are the challenges of the set as we’ve never played them live before. New songs always activate a level of peripheral panic and I tend to get through them with my brain perpetually telling me that I’m about to forget a word or mess up a line, self talk that’s guaranteed to become a self fulfilling prophecy, but not so much when being countered by the feeling in the room tonight, I’m still largely at ease and convince myself that the bum note I played is a form of jazz. I love that TSSUW offers something entirely new live, a moment to step away from guitar and keyboard and just hold a mic and sing, even if just for one verse and chorus before the piano starts it’s like playing the gig on easy mode, I just have to remember to get the mic back on the mic stand before verse 2 starts, close call. We enter the last section of the set by lifting the energy with ‘The Road’ and ‘The Water’ and before we know it we’ve reached the intro to the final song in which I forget to mention Patreon, I forget to mention this mailing list, I almost forget to mention that we even have a merch stand (when it comes to sales, Jeffery Bezos I am not). The last thing I said to the crowd before we began to play ‘Hollow’ was that we’re about to play a cover of Wonderwall by Oasis, cue nervous laughter from the crowd. We finished the set, the photo above was taken, the card reader did not work on the merch stand but still we had great chats with great fans while signing posters and we left the show fully energised to get this album out to the world. If you were there we thank you for that!
As we left the venue ‘The Lexington’ in the early hours of Thursday morning I thought of how it’s hosted the likes of Florence & The Machine, The XX & Wolf Alice on their ascension and how we’d happily take any of their trajectories from here on out. I’m starting to believe that there’s something in telling the universe your plans out loud and so in the next newsletter I’ll share my matured dreams and goals with you and the cosmos, I’ve had plenty of time to think about them and they’ve ever-changed since I was a 13 year old that wanted to be Robbie Williams, an 18 Year old that wanted to be Morrissey, and a 25 year old that wanted to be Thom Yorke 🪐✨
Vinyl Pre-Order is going in this week. We’re blown away by the amount of pre-orders so far and there’s still time to get your own copy of the first editions below!
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There are now close to 80 members of our fan army The Mountaineers, hosted across Patreon, Discord and MusicNFT’s. If you’d love to see and hear much more of our process and enjoy the benefits below then check out our Patreon!
As a Patron you’ll get access to the the original song demos for the album, +the instrumentals, the song Lyrics & Chords, and coming soon a photo & video vault from the album sessions // you’ll also get instant access to an existing catalogue of 40+ posts of content including unreleased songs, a monthly livestream hang with Belle Mt., a full live show video, livestream concert recordings and entry into a discord chat group where we share all the info first and more!
Loved reading this so much 😍 I loved it from the audience side, so it's so good to hear your feelings and thoughts too 😍😘 xx
Thanks so much for sharing the experience with us. Even as far away as Milwaukee, Wisconsin I can feel the energy and picture myself in the crowd and feeling all the feels. I would be crying throughout - cleansing tears. You’re amazing. Thanks for sharing your gift and for being so vulnerable. Keep going!!!