A mountain of a songwriter came to UCLA last Thursday. Phil
Elvrum, playing under the new moniker Mt. Eerie, strummed and sang
his way through a warm, intimate performance at Kerckhoff Grand
Salon in the early afternoon.
Formerly known and critically acclaimed as The Microphones,
Elvrum’s current tour with Japanese singer-songwriter Nikaido
Kazumi features a solo acoustic venture even more shy and wide-eyed
than his recordings.
Kazumi, unknown in America before the tour, seems destined for
great things. Singing in Japanese, she reached vocal heights
strongly reminiscent of Bjork while pick-strumming an acoustic
guitar in a style similar to indie-folk icon Cat Power. After her
short but amazing set, Elvrum took the stage and introduced
himself.
Armed with a lone guitar, he played a set of entirely new songs
with the notable exception of fan request “I Felt Your
Shape.” Elvrum’s recordings have long had an
experimental nature to them, and often are filled with open spaces
and lo-fi fuzz. To see his songs stripped bare was an emotional
experience.
After his ambitious, concept-driven “Mt. Eerie”
album of earlier this year, Evrum seems to have returned to his
favorite themes. The audience remained completely silent as he sang
poetic lyrics about nature and love. His beautiful folk guitar
playing, often minimized in his recordings, was secondary to his
first-person monologues of feelings and surroundings. The songs
were full of imagery as Elvrum told stories about “feet
slapping pavement” and being alone in the snow.
While all of the songs were strong, highlights included an
extended performance of “I Felt Your Shape” and a new
song that may be entitled “I Love You So Much!” which
featured a call-and-answer between Elvrum and himself. Using the
same guitar as Kazumi, he strummed with his thumb rather than a
pick, making it all the more powerful when he finally attacked the
guitar and rocked out.
As warm and endearing as his albums, Phil Elvrum is one of the
best, most personal songwriters around and delivered an impressive
performance.
-David Greenwald