Head Space Daily Words...

Kate Tempest is one of those rare talents you know will never fall off the radar. She is not a manufactured act who will crash and burn but is an individual who has nurtured and developed her craft and from whom a lot more will come. As she told us between defiant, impassioned delivery of the always thought provoking, sometimes funny, often hopeless lines from her album Everybody Down, during her performance at Village Underground in Shoreditch on Tuesday night, the work has been “Twelve years in the making and it’s only just beginning.” She also confided that she “cannot stop writing.” It is one thing to have ideas and to pick up a pen; it is another to make those ideas a reality, to coerce them into life on the page, to be fleshed out within the guise of believable characters that come alive in your mind’s eye.

I have been taking in the album throughout the year, since its release in May and whilst you can obviously listen to tracks individually, it is an album that tells a compelling story, which the listener has to invest and immerse themselves in to fully appreciate the ups and downs and development of the adventure.

From reading articles about her, Kate Tempest has evolved musically through an education in hip hop and dancehall, absorbing musical cultures, social cultures and teaching herself how to rhyme and deliver, which she fully acts out. It is true performance as she spits forth her words, with anger, affection, love, hate. These subtly shifting tones being led and intertwined with a sometime pulsating, bass reverberating, always engaging club soundtrack.

In fact it is beyond performance. She is living those words, she is feeling her story, she is wrapped up in the emotion, caught up in the lives she portrays. As with all good live performances, the music and lyrics take you beyond the record. A spark of the unknown always exists, living slightly on the edge. Musically it went further. I can still feel the bass vibrating in my throat and chest like a pneumatic drill. The backing vocalist really added to the tracks, making a lively contribution, which I don’t feel on the recording and the musicians were all absolutely spot on, twisting the sounds within the confines of the story. 

When the performers are so obviously enjoying what they are doing, it lifts the crowd. One minute Tempest looks stressed to the point of no return, the next she radiates her fantastic, ecstatic smile, fresh faced with rosy cheeks on either side and a twinkle in her eye. She loves being up on the stage.

The last time I read any poetry was at school but Seeing Kate Tempest has opened me up and I bought a copy of her latest book of poetry Hold Your Own, which she signed after the show – I’m a sucker for things like that!! Sat down behind a table, facing a line of punters, she was totally spent. Putting that amount of energy into a performance must be sapping and I don’t think she was quite all there as she signed the books but to be even doing that at all, so soon after the show, is testament that she wants to maintain contact with people and she was truly grateful of the support and to be where she is today.

Tempest is extremely aware and affected by what is going on in the world around her; and her writing, although not necessarily explicitly, is going to have a political skew as she expresses her opinion. To have a person fearlessly putting herself out there in this way, instead of the vacuous mass produced pop stars that are churned out as part of the money go round, is essential in music and popular culture. Kate Tempest will always be vital because she has something to say. Her sign off was a warning to us all, in today’s culture of mindless consumerism and lack of community, with a message we should all heed - “Battle your greed, cultivate your empathy.” If we could all do this, the world would be better off.