One evening, towards the end of 2014, a friend came home and shared an online video with myself and a few others of someone he knew growing up in Kommetjie. A young-singer-songwriter-busker who made her way onto TED Talk, Berlin. I don't think anyone will forget the first time they hear this voice. Not only singing in a way that will often well up a tear to the eye but also speaking good truths about being and creating, with which I resonated deeply.
Fast forward a few weeks and I'm knocking on the door of a house in Camp Street (Cape Town) to paint a random mural and the very same person from the video, surprisingly and half asleep, answers the door. The conversation went something along the ones of:
"You're Alice Phoebe Lou?!"
"I just watched a video of you in Berlin?"
"i just watched a video of you here, in Cape Town?"
"This is soooooo weird… nice to meet you!"
Fast forward another week or two and I'm at the Wild Spirit, in Natures Valley, for a New Years party via a last minute decision and this "Alice Phoebe Lou", again to my surprise, is playing on the night. I hear her voice, this time not through hi-fi speakers but rather in reality, surrounded by the warmest setting you could conjure up in your imagination. I watch, perplexed, as a whole crowd is hypnotised and briefly taken somewhere else. Lovers can't hep but kiss. Those alone suddenly don't feel so alone. It all stills.
The next night, I play a few songs of my own around our intimate campsite. Alice listens in. Afterward, she tells me she actually likes my music and I should do something more about it, possibly even collaborate with her some time. It's a scary compliment I'm not sure I'm ready to hear but something definitely ticked over in my mind. I retreat back into my world, seeing things a little differently.
Fast forward a few months more and Alice is now nearing completion of her first solo album. She has asked a number of artists and friends, including myself, to create a visual interpretation of a song off the track list. I choose "Society" and put up an illegal piece under the Buitenkant Bridge in Cape Town and photograph it. A few weeks later, the city council tears the piece down and paints over it, leaving an off grey-on-grey square as a reminder instead. An ironic sigh escapes my lips.
Time passes again... We're now in January of this year and I receive a message from Alice in my inbox, asking if I'd be interested in creating the actual cover artwork and design for her album, titled Orbit. She says she was in Natures Valley again, meditating on the question of Who, when I popped into her head. Needless to say, I jumped onboard. The great brainstorms rolled in. It was also during this process of creating that I was asked if I'd finally like to play at a gig Alice was organising, alongside some other incredible artists. This time, albeit with great nerves, I am ready and willing. I play my first live act at the end of February. The event was beautiful. I leave a few days later, inspired, to spend 3 months in Amsterdam for another job and to complete the album artwork.
NOW we're in the present. Alice was here last week to open for another band and came by for a visit, bringing with her a freshly printed and cut LP in the process. What a crazy thought to think: the first record I own is one I have been involved in artistically. And the musician is not only a talented human being but now, just over a year and a half later, a friend.
It's so beautiful to watch someone grow and to be involved, even slightly, feels even better. It's also uplifting to watch someone share that growth with others, bringing them up simultaneously through collaboration and following their intuition. I've said it before but there are so many talented people involved in this album, both musically and artistically, that I would say it's worth investing in. And I'm proud and even grateful to have played some part in it's making.
To all of you involved in what lies here at my feet, great work. Feel that virtual tap on the back, read between the lines of possibility and fate. And make MORE.
I thought that was a story worth sharing.
