Patrick Duff, The Mount Without, Bristol review - sacred music for the soul

There is an atmosphere of otherworldly stillness within the stony womb of a large dilapidated church in Bristol, at the bottom of St Michael’s Hill, the winding road that climbs up to what used to be the favoured place of execution, where the city’s sombre gibbets stood.

For a special show by the singer-songwriter Patrick Duff, this deconsecrated place of worship, provides a perfect space to present a mostly new set of remarkable songs, in which he explores with touching candour lost loves, the torment of a confused identity and disillusion with a world of over-reaching ambitions and lies. He’s lit the space, now a venue known as The Mount Without, with hundreds of candles, of different sizes, strategically placed to make the most of the building’s magical mix of gothic and neo-classical, the vaulted ceiling roughly painted with blue sky and swirling clouds, and a massive hanging sculpture, in the shape of the lemniscate – the infinity-sign – the symbol that crowns The Magician’s head in the Tarot’s Major Arcana. For this is indeed a show of pure magic, and, although the church has been de-commissioned, a celebration of the sacred that keeps us from sinking into the darkness – within and without.

He’s alone, barely visible thanks to minimal light from many flickering flames, along with Woody Taylor, a guitarist of great sensitivity, the perfect foil and support for the self-effacement that characterises so many of the songs, and the incandescent bombast of moments when the general melancholy mood bursts into something a great deal more fiery. At every moment, Woody is there, far more than a backing musician, a star in his own right, and yet always in devoted service to the singer and the songs, teasing all manner of sound out of his instrument and various digital effects.

As the years have gone by, over the 25 or so years since Patrick Duff renounced all drink and drugs, his songs have moved from sharply satirical and surrealistic, to increasingly self-revelatory. His vocal technique has become ever more versatile and assured, and yet increasingly daring in its heartfelt expression of authentic feeling. Vulnerability lies at the heart of Duff’s character, or in other words, his fate. Not having the thick skin or armour that protects so many – or a willingness to adopt a fierce or narcissistic public persona – it wasn’t surprising that he should fall into heavy substance abuse, as a way of surviving, not least as an increasingly successful rock star, when he was frontman for the 90s band Strangelove.

And yet he came through. The journey since has required immense courage and resolution. His voyage of self-discovery has been nourished not just by courage but by faith – not of the strictly born-again kind, but something deeper and more mystical. Never afraid to confront his demons, and ready to share his insecurity with listeners, he touches raw areas of emotion that are familiar to us all. There’s an intimacy in his lyrics, not just because he writes so well, but because he sings without mannerisms, straight from the heart, yet without ever being mawkish or confessional. Unrequited love, a catastrophic sense of being no-one, feeling at sea in a madly competitive world: all of these he shares in a manner that’s both low-key and heart-busting.

Today's vulnerable male archetype reflects the disintegration of cultural values long relied upon: the posturing and dangerous assurances of machismo. But there’s nothing weak about these songs or their singer, uttered with such an extraordinary mix of innocence and wisdom. It’s as if Patrick Duff had been born with wounds as well as unusual spiritual strength. The paradoxical combination of raw vulnerability with a willingness to be exposed creates something uniquely powerful and appealing. There remains plenty of the charisma that made him such a crowd-pleasing rock frontman back in the 1990’s, but it's held back, never overdone. He has undeniable presence, which paradoxically, given his predilection for self-effacement, expresses the same near-shamanic quality of his rock'n'roll days.

A reluctant and sometimes ironically self-deprecating master of the show, he’s nevertheless a celebrant – singing his way through the wonderfully varied – if mostly fairly melancholic – material from his most recent album released at the end of last year, and beautifully produced by composer Drew Morgan. The two encores encapsulate the contrasting moods of a show which has clearly had the audience transported: “End of the Road”, which as its title implies is about darkness and resignation, is followed by the most beautiful and beguiling song he’s ever written, “Lonely Man”, a hit-in-the-making for sure, in which solitude is elevated into something full of grace.

The wonder of Patrick Duff’s show arises out of his re-investing an abandoned church with its original purpose: to gather people together in a celebration of love and in the presence of the divine. He does so without priesthood or liturgy, but the essence is the same. This music is sacred, and totally of now.

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