He’s, in spite of everything, somebody who’s constructed a profession on agonising pauses, routinely adopting a pinched, disapproving stare as he surveys a packed-out theatre for indicators of sentient life. A minimum of, that is Stewart Lee the comic. Stewart Lee the music fan, it seems, is only a man in a charity store thumbing by means of a weathered stack of Glen Campbell information, chuckling good-naturedly on the cowl artwork.
He is managed to sneak ten songs into his 9 Songs choices, and at first, appears nearly noncommittal. “They had been simply issues that I considered once you requested me,” he shrugs. Lee is ceaselessly curating music, in spite of everything; he is handpicked a stage for the Brighton Psych this month, and in January will introduce a few of his favorite acts at The Lexington’s Storage Punk Greats present.
However for all he would possibly suggest this record materialised out of skinny air, there is a particular theme working by means of his selections: artists sticking round lengthy sufficient to get a second likelihood.
Lee’s personal path to musical obsession was a well-trodden one – listening to John Peel after lights-out. He remembers the heightened anticipation, one finger hovering above the tape participant. “In the event you preferred the sound of a tune, and even the sound of a band’s identify, you’d press file in case you by no means heard it once more,” he displays. “It was that feeling of all the things disappearing, you needed to snatch the tradition because it was falling previous you.”
Hardly ever was it love at first pay attention. Bands like The Fall felt insufferable to start with, an unsolicited endurance check, “till I immediately thought, ‘That is completely sensible.’” It turned out that essentially the most discordant sounds made the best impression on a teenage Lee, and if a band additionally boasted a cantankerous frontman like Mark E. Smith, even higher. He nonetheless retains that mushy spot for curmudgeons and outsider figures, whether or not spiky post-punk visionaries or unassuming people singers quietly holding centuries-old ballads alive.
There’s additionally jazz, which Lee loves for its spontaneity, taking the listener on prolonged, summary detours earlier than winding up proper again the place it began. Apart from apparent parallels along with his stand-up, Lee’s listening habits observe this impulse too, circling again to previous favourites many years after the primary encounter.
“I am now a person who listens to the issues that he grew up with and tries to say they’re higher than what’s from now,” he presents, though this is not strictly true, since he’ll fortunately take band suggestions from his kids.
Lots of the comic’s private heroes stay deeply reluctant idols, soldiering on by means of obscurity, with careers that embody a number of acts. However as he observes, fascinating issues occur to your music should you hold in there: it would not matter in case your voice cracks or your failures stack up, the passage of time can season songwriting to perfection. Even the better-known entities he is chosen, like Dylan, nonetheless make investments their materials with the bluff, unvarnished frankness of lived expertise. It is storytelling that cuts to the short, carried out with stripped-back honesty and understatement.
In the meantime, Lee is being measured for a werewolf go well with. His new present ‘Stewart Lee vs The Man-Wulf’ opens in December and was impressed by a sure breed of larger-than-life comic, normally, however not completely American, whose pantomime shock issue emboldens them to voice their worst prejudices out loud. He’ll take to the stage first as himself, then re-emerge as a comedic firebrand in matted fur, a blustering beast with a persecution advanced and a large following.
“I’ll carry out the fabric like an indignant Netflix act, in order that all the things turns into about hating different individuals – like these American rage comics who go round blaming everybody else for their very own faults,” he explains. “It is fascinating, as a result of I believe I am going to most likely be capable of do issues and say issues in a fancy dress that I am unable to as myself.”
It is absolutely the alternative tack from the musicians featured right here, most of whom aren’t precisely identified for his or her flamboyant performances or right-wing tirades. Neither, after all, is Stewart Lee. That is the place the Man-Wulf is available in: baiting him to commerce his quietly embittered cult comic routine for a collection of unambiguously hate-fuelled, crowd-pleasing rants. But when a well-cut werewolf go well with can cowl a large number of sins, Lee means that his would possibly solely go away him feeling extra uncovered.
“I might prefer to be fairly rangy as a werewolf, but in addition at a weight I can preserve throughout the rigours of an eighteen-month tour, the place you need to eat and drink at odd occasions of the day,” he concludes. “You’ll be able to’t actually disguise in a werewolf costume, are you able to?”
Leave a Reply