The Silent Frontman
There he was on stage, thrashing about in stacked, pointy patent leather boots, a black ‘Elvis’ emblazoned t-shirt and dark sunglasses. His long wisping grey hair stayed strangely still as he gesticulated and thumped before the audience. Hunched in deep concentration, bowing into existence cat gutted mewling. He’s a druid, wailing for us dumbass souls to repent on this Good Friday. I didn’t get the music, but I felt it as I let it entrance me. I saw it, I knew and I reveled. As fore-wanted, the revelation came to me soon after I came to terms with the fact the beer I was drinking was IPA garbage that would be poured down the drain.
I have always preferred Warren Ellis to his more famous best friend. When I fell into the cave of the Bad Seeds, the marked shift within the band’s music that happens somewhere in the mid-nineties, is where I got properly lost. This Ellis-ian shift added depth and creativity to their sound that was more thoughtful than their raucous days. A shift that allowed me to listen to Nick’s lyrics more closely and understand that he indeed was a writer. That’s the genius of the sideman, or silent frontman as I call them, they bring out the best and provide the soulful edge a frontman’s ego does not allow. When writing songs, they’re the ones who say, let’s try this, with the ‘this’ being the gold. Silent Frontmen have the artistic Midas touch, yet don’t require the crown.
Watching Warren Ellis doing his thing with the Dirty Three, I wondered how he did it. How he so confidently did his own thing some of the time, then the other time he played an invisible force to a huge name. I remember seeing Nick Cave live and hating the show, mainly because Cave was so incredibly contemptuous of the audience, like ‘you middle-aged rich fucks think you’re still punk. You’re not, so pay me $150 bucks as penance for being posers.’ Ellis was on stage that night at the Beacon, yet when I recollect, I don’t remember seeing him—and that man can’t not be seen. I just know that he was there, guiding the music in a melodious direction that occasionally took away from Cave’s insufferable persona.
What was my revelation, you’d like to know? That I won’t reveal. As much as I love exploring through writing, sometimes it’s best not to give it all away. I saw a great live music show yet can’t quite understand why it was great. The music was at times obtuse, and fuck if I can remember a single tune, but it was simply awesome. A show that in its quiet power I will remember for a long time. Not every time must an experience be dissected. Every once in a while, you need to put your sunglasses on, heck your ego at the gate and just be there.
*Image: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner Selbstbildnis mit Modell*
