“Everything you create is a reflection of where you’re at”. So said Nick Mulvey when discussing the themes of his current album Wake Up Now recently. Finding himself dissatisfied with the original set of demos (describing them as too clinical), the former member of Portico Quartet concentrated on family life following the birth of his child. Gradually returning to work on the project with a group of like-minded local musicians (including his wife Isadora), the album began to form more organically and became an outstanding, multi-layered piece of work. Wake Up Now has a thoughtful and conscientious feeling, with strands of African music intertwined throughout. With the rain lashing down on a blustery night in Bexhill, it was far from an African climate that met Mulvey and the band.

Support came from Liverpool indie-pop band All We Are, who started off with a seductive version of ‘Burn It All Out’ and a crowd-pleasing ‘Feel Safe’. With more than a few similarities with The xx at the start, the longer their short set continued the more their sound twisted into new shapes. Bassist Guro Gikling and drummer Rich O’Flynn swapped vocals throughout, culminating in a stunning rendition of ‘Dreamer’. This took on almost a trance-like quality towards the end, Gikling's powerful roar colliding with a dramatic guitar solo from Luís Santos. There was more than enough here from the versatile trio to keep them on the watchlist for the future, and an interesting choice to open for the more sedate Mulvey.

As Mulvey began with ‘Remembering’, the African-tinged rhythms and influences came straight to the fore. Instantly fully engrossed in his music, every gesture and word exuded warmth as he strummed gently on guitar. ‘Unconditional’ received a huge welcome from the packed crowd, who were eating out of the palm of his hand for the whole night. There seemed to have been a conscious focus on moving on from his debut, as First Mind was only represented by a handful of songs, with those that have survived the cut seeming to take on new life with this new fuller band set-up. ‘Juramidam’ in particular took flight, a hypnotic groove echoing around the Pavilion during its extended outro.

Throughout the show, Mulvey gave the impression of someone who could be found singing around a communal campfire on a remote beach in some far-flung land. ‘Imogen’ only heightened this feeling, as the entire band gathered closely together at the front of the stage. An engaging host, Mulvey was quick to add context to particular moments. He described both albums’ themes as “the search for a deeper self-knowledge”, and ‘Myela’, (the lyrics of which are mainly all the own words of refugees), as one that existed “in a world where there’s not much truth out there”. During that track, Fifi Dewey showcased the different qualities brought by each individual in the band with a blistering, pulsating guitar solo.

Despite the context of some of those songs, the show always stayed the right side of being overly earnest with regular moments of levity to break the mood. At the start of a solo version of ‘Cucurucu’, Mulvey suffered a coughing fit before joking, “You remember that bit from the record, right?”. The refrain from that song seemed to capture the mood of the entire evening, as he sang “My heart beats with a ceaseless longing of a yearning to belong”, the whole audience was with him in a true communal feeling. Nick Mulvey’s mission is to eradicate the “them and us” mentality of the world, and tonight was a moment that brought everyone together, leaving only us.

Jamie Macmillan

Website: nickmulvey.com
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