Beth Gibbons' voice can cleave your heart in half and heal it back together. Whether fronting Portishead, singing Henryk Górecki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs or guesting on a Kendrick Lamar track, Gibbons' frail, yet resilient timbre acts as reassurance that our aching world is worth loving and fighting for. To experience that voice is humbling; up close, it's breathtaking.
This set at the Tiny Desk is mostly culled from Lives Outgrown, her densely layered and lived-in album released last year. Sonically, Gibbons' solo debut feels worlds apart from the haunted electronic production of Portishead, yet her existential themes of loss, change and restless curiosity remain. There is, however, an invitation within these new songs to bear witness to Gibbons' own tragedy and transformation. In the daylight of the NPR Music office, she closes her eyes as she leans into the uncertainty of the moment, and turns away once a song ends.
For this performance, Gibbons and her seven-piece band opt to perform entirely acoustic, scaling down their sprawling stage show to emphasize the intimacy of these songs. In a way, these versions feel like homemade experiments knit together by trusted comrades — the arrangements still creak with awe and wonder, but the empyrean textures become more grounded. They close with "Mysteries," the opening track from 2002's Out of Season, Gibbons' album-length collaboration with Rustin Man (aka Talk Talk's Paul Webb). "Oh, mysteries of love where war is no more / I'll be there anytime," she sings. But when she turns away this time, Gibbons emits a surprisingly loud and piercing sound from deep within — a wordless warble that reflects all too well that she might have to wait for the turbulence to subside.
SET LIST
- "Tell Me Who You Are Today"
- "Floating on a Moment"
- "Lost Changes"
- "Mysteries"
MUSICIANS
- Beth Gibbons: vocals
- Eoin Rooney: guitar, background vocals
- Jason Hazeley: piano
- Richard Jones: viola, guitar, background vocals
- Tom Herbert: bass, background vocals
- Emma Smith: violin, background vocals
- Howard Jacobs: percussion, wind instruments, background vocals
- Sophie Hastings: drums, background vocals
TINY DESK TEAM
- Producer: Lars Gotrich
- Director/Editor: Maia Stern
- Audio Technical Director: Josh Newell
- Host/Series Producer: Bobby Carter
- Videographers: Maia Stern, Joshua Bryant, Kara Frame
- Audio Engineer: Tiffany Vera-Castro
- Production Assistants: Dora Levite, Ashley Pointer
- Photographer: Alanté Serene
- Tiny Desk Copy Editor: Hazel Cills
- Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
- Series Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson
- VP, Visuals and Music: Keith Jenkins
