Recording: Devon Welsh

Artist: Devon Welsh

Song: Comedian

Recorded at The Theatre Centre (Long Winter 5.3), February 4, 2017.

Devon Welsh - Comedian

The season's third Long Winter found a spot just a few doors from its old Queen and Dovercourt home at The Theatre Centre. Using both the upstairs main space and the main floor Incubator, there was music up and down all night long. Devon Walsh, recently reincarnated as a solo artist after his work as Majical Cloudz was perhaps the night's biggest attraction. Once I put together who he was, I approached his set with some trepidation, given how his past work rubbed me the wrong way so strongly. But interestingly, possibly showing some signs of maturity on my part (or on Walsh's) I actually rather enjoyed his new turn. Perhaps it wasn't so different musically, with songs based on "very simple" loops with no extra frills to vary them. But they were delivered from a different place, with a large dollop of self-awareness and an ability to make fun of himself. (After declaring the songs to all be love songs, for example, one of them was dedicated to his moustache.) And songs like this one held back from "going big" on the vocals to gain tension from their restraint. A worthy reinvention and a reminder to sometimes take things in without paying too much heed to one's past preconceptions.

[Brandon Caswell Douglas got some sweet footage of the night which you can check out here. Long Winter ends the season with a return to the Gladstone Hotel on Friday, March 24th with music by Deliluh, Leanne Simpson, Protruders, Doom Tickler, Bonnie Trash, Bunny, HEX, Midge, Clamaglamza, Joel Eel and Sistem.]