“When I was a child I never knew enough/ what that would do to me”
- Aldous Harding in The Barrel
When Aldous Harding comes on stage she moves slowly towards the middle. There seems no incentive to hurry. Her movements feel very deliberate. Not in a previously thought out way, but as if every pace needs to be considered. Later, there are more moments like this. When trying to remove the microphone from its stand she takes very much her time to get the cable unwrapped from its pole. She looks as if her mind is somewhere else, daydreaming perhaps. And then she speaks, a rare occasion: “Will they ever invent an easier way to do this?”, referring to the unease with which the microphone cable circles of it’s stand.
During the concert it is hard to not be mesmerized by Aldous Harding not just as a singer, but as a presence. During the first song, Designer, she decides to dance, but in her very own way; very stilted, almost wooden, with her hands slightly stretched out as if she tries to catch something. If you don’t know what I mean, check out the clip for her song The Barrel. This is a dance that shows some unease, yet at the same time when I looked at it I couldn’t see anything else than someone in trance with the music. In a strange, unexpected way, it feels like the correct way to move there.
Then there is her face. While singing or playing there is no attempt to keep her face look pretty or presentable according to any norm we know. She frowns, her eyes roll, her features contort, there are grimaces aplenty. Is she in pain? Does she feel the music in her own way? (Is it a hipster act?, the cynics ask).
But above everything else there are her eyes. They are something you notice easily, even when she is off-stage, like in clips and or video interviews. She stares intently. During the concert she looked around and seemed to make it a point to watch segments of the audience everywhere, making sure not to forget even the people on the upper balcony of Paradiso in Amsterdam, who are hard to see at the best of times. Yet, when she points her eyes at one space she will rest it there for maybe a minute, unwavering, intensely. As if she is looking at one person in the audience, specifically, with a clear purpose, at least for her.
At one point I felt I was the focus of her gaze. It is always hard to tell where someone on stage is really looking at, so I might have imagined it. Still, there it made a certain logical sense: there were spotlights aimed at the audience and I was straight in the middle of one (to the detriment of my eyes at times). So naturally, her gaze would automatically be directed towards me. I don’t know how long she looked at me – 30 seconds? 10? A minute?; at least not the whole song (Zoo Eyes) –, but regardless the actual length, it felt intense.
Usually I don’t like focusing on a musicians outward appearance. Regularly I would have written something about the music for a long time now. In case of Aldous Harding though, there is a hint towards the true nature in the way she carries herself that enhances the understanding of the music. When I discovered her work two year ago around the release of her second album Party I immediately felt there was something off about it, in a good way. Yet there was also a lot of beauty and a certain quality that is classic, almost traditional. It took me a while to get around to her music videos, but if I had looked at them earlier I might have understood earlier that Aldous Harding is a very weird lady; and although ‘weird’ might hold negative connotations for some, I couldn’t use it in a more kind and positive way here.
What attracted me at first was the voice; a pretty common thing for me. I heard Horizon and noticed how her vocals changed over the course of the song in a way that gives a strangeness to the whole. It holds a very feminine beauty the one moment, but during the sort-of-chorus in which she states “Here is your princess/ And here is the horizon” her voice becomes more shrill; lamentable maybe. Something similar happens on the song Party, except when her voice changes during the chorus-like “If there is a party/ I’d wait for you”, it sounds not like uncontained sadness, but ecstatic. On the same album we also find Imagining My Man, where her voice goes deep, as if she is a classic jazz singer. Still, even on that more vocally restrained song, there are short eruptions where she seeks a higher range.
These songs are all from her second album, the breakthrough Party. Her first self-titled album was quite another affair. That is a very classic folk album and her voice is more constant throughout, sounding like Sandy Denny from Fairport Convention (many of the words on that album might have been considered by Denny too). Now I like Sandy Denny and Fairport Convention a lot, but that debut album by Aldous Harding, while good, doesn’t get to what makes Aldous Harding such a good artist on her own merits. There are only hints to what is too come and I find it uneven overall (opener Stop Your Tears is a gem though). I listened to it four times now, but that is not an album I want to get into too much here.
It was on the second album that Harding really found her voice, in a very literal way. Or is it better to say that she learned to trust her voice more? She has great range, landing as comfortable in higher zones as she does in lower registers. She sounds naturally beautiful (something I also noticed in interviews), but is not afraid to go ugly if a song requires it. Sandy Denny is mostly gone and what we get is a voice that sounds certainly more contemporary, but at times also more ancient and ageless. For me, to listen to Aldous Harding is to be transported by the sound of a voice into another world.
And yet, yet, there is a lot more that goes on here. As powerful and unique as her voice is, the lyrics and the music hold a lot of the appeal. Lyrics might seem obvious – I mean she belongs to the singer/ songwriter genre. Here is the catch though: I rarely have a clue what she is singing about. Her lyrics barely make any logical sense. I think I get what Imagining My Man is about and perhaps Weight of the Planets, but otherwise she completely lost me after her first album. And her work is all the stronger for it.
Clear lyrics are great, but an openness can be even greater. I may not have a real inkling at what Harding is getting at most of the time, but I feel her words and not just because she sings them well. They have an associative, dreamlike quality that can be moving if you can get into the right mindset. “What am I doing in Dubai?”, “I heard your song from inside the maze/ every one you made”, “I broke my neck dancing to the edge of the world, babe”… etc. I can recite a lot, but these words are not meant to be read, but to be heard. Listening to these songs over and over again made the words become clear in my mind, but I couldn’t explain any of them. Also, I don’t really want to.
Harding herself has spoken about the meaning of her lyrics and she can’t really express it either. She explained that she doesn’t write from a very logical focal point, but indeed from association. She thinks about the quality of words, of what emotional meaning they might hold, or just how the sound of them carries a certain quality. It is worth to note that Aldous Harding is a curious interviewee. She takes her time to answer, preferring to think about it. She loses her train of thought frequently and doesn’t always succeed to make the answer connect to the question. It almost goes without saying that sometimes it isn’t quite clear what she means. I think in every interview I read or seen with her she apologized for not being good at interviews. Similarly, at the end of the concert Harding thanked us, the audience, for being so kind as to accept that she doesn’t really talk between songs.
So we have an unusual voice and abstract lyrics. Why does her work still feel so light, so easy to take in? It is the music that carries these elements. If her voice is her obvious weapon, her gift for melody is her secret one. After her folky debut she went for something else starting on Party. She works with a band, but makes them sound sparse, elegant and cold in a pleasant way. The production is open and spacy, creating something at once very clear and a little unreal. The playing is dynamic, unexpected yet controlled and full of detail. It gives the songs an almost aching and fragile beauty, something to make you ease into them. The truth is that the compositions frequently are beautiful enough the work on their own, without voice or words, but in combinations with them the songs become something that sounds slightly out of this world. At first glance, especially if listened to superficially her songs might seem traditional, but if you pay attention they become unusual.
What it all boils down to is the strange appeal of Aldous Harding. I was impressed enough with her before seeing her live, but seeing her perform the songs put everything in its right place. Here was someone who is indeed unusual, strange and defiantly herself. If you look at her pained expressions during interviews, if you hear her hesitations there, if you see her move and if you hear her endlessly apologizing for not being a communicative wonder you will see the real miracle of her music. Here is truly an artist who seems to be able only really to communicate with her music and her associative, lyrical musings. Her distress becomes beautiful music. Her curious train of thought becomes poetry. In the meantime, her voice rips your soul to shreds.
The concert was only 70 minutes long. People complained about the short length. Aldous Harding always seemed very surprised when we applauded (loudly!) and I suspect she was generous giving us 70 minutes. Looking online I found out that she played one or two songs more than in all previous concerts. I thought these 70 minutes were magical and even if I always want more of a good thing I am generous for every minute she gave us. When you hand over your soul to people, 70 minutes is a hell of a time.
Note, I saw Aldous Harding live in Paradiso in Amsterdam on Wednesday November 27th 2019.
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I really want to end the piece here, but at the same time I feel that I want to share my thoughts on the albums, especially Party and Designer (on the debut I don’t have all that much more to say). So I do that here briefly. Consider this as some add-on to the previous text.
My thoughts on both Party and Designer is very similar. They seem to be of a piece. Party is slightly rawer, Designer has maybe a little more beauty. Which I prefer is probably the one I listened to the last. On a End-of-Decade list I might put Party above Designer based on the sense of discovery Party gave me.
Are these two albums masterpieces? I don’t think so, but they are very close. Quite a few songs on there are real masterpieces, especially Horizon from Party and The Barrel from Designer should be very high on any End of Decade list (but of course aren’t). Both albums have a very strong first half, with five or six great songs creating a beautiful flow. Then something happens that breaks that flow. The two of them both have two songs that are somewhat too restrained, that make the albums lose momentum (I’m So Sorry and The World Is Looking For You on Party, Heaven Is Empty and Pilot on Designer). Designer also has Damn as it’s sixth song. A good song really, but one that stills the whole.
Still, despite not being true, blue masterpieces I still would give them an 8+, because what is good is incredible and nothing is actually bad.
What, you want a top 10 songs? Here you go:
1. Horizon
2. The Barrel
3. Zoo Eyes
4. Party
5. Blend
6. Designer
7. Imagining My Man
8. Fixture Picture
9. What If Birds Aren’t Singing They’re Screaming
10. Stop Your Tears
Honorable mention: Nobody Gets What They Want Anymore. I didn’t include this incredible song because it is by her ex Marlon Williams and “only” features Aldous Harding, but it is more than worth a listen.
I could make a playlist of this, but I’d just advice you to listen to at least Party and Designer. They are not that much longer than this playlist would be and a playlist feels redundant.
