Photos by Georgina Johnson | Edits by moi
Around the holiday season, I was listening to Christmas albums and thought, Bruno Major should record a Christmas album. His music is the type I love listening to on cosy nights in, which is basically every night. I popped by his Instagram to see what he was up to and found out that he had a North American tour coming up and would be going through Philly. I manically texted my friends to see if any of them listened to Bruno Major (not Mars!) and would want to see him in concert with me. I began subtly sneaking Bruno Major songs into all my playlists and playing them when I hung out with friends. (Strategy = inception!) I finally lured Georgina in and we were set to go.
Mother Nature tried to deter us, what with a snow storm the day before the concert and thus shutting down public transportation the day of the concert, but we had been looking forward to the concert ever since November, and not to be dramatic or anything, but it was one of the few things we were looking forward to in life currently, so there was no way we weren’t going, even if that meant catching a Lyft to and from the city, costing way more than our concert tickets (tickets were $15 each, Lyft was $65~ round trip). But we made it! And what made it all the sweeter was that it was my first time at this venue (Johnny Brenda’s, a “tavern” and concert venue), and it was Georgina’s first time at a Philly concert at all!
Do you ever listen to music but not hear the words? I’m almost always listening to music (waking, working, walking, you name it!), so I often play music just for the background. And especially so with Bruno Major, because I find his music so smooth, jazzy, and atmospheric. But when you’re at a concert and the music is there in front of you, you can’t help but listen to the words. And even if you already know the words, the artist gives you a new context for the song, and the song takes on new meaning.
Before the concert, “Easily” was my favourite song of his, and Georgina’s favourite was “Home.” In fact, it was the only song of his she knew, and she still came to the concert with me, bless her! Now ever since the concert, the both of us have been loving “Second Time.” At the concert, he sang it with his pianist Eloise and it was so lovely. I found a video of the live duet from another concert of his on Youtube, which you can watch here. (They met via Instagram?! She covered “Second Time” and he saw it and recognised her talent and she joined the band whaaat.) But the real breakout for me was “Cold Blood.” The studio recording doesn’t come close to the live performance, but there’s the link anyway. Unfortunately I couldn’t find a live performance on Youtube for this one. The live performance had an energy and intensity that isn’t completely captured in the studio recording. He also covered Drake’s “Hold On, We’re Going Home,” which was pretty rad. Here‘s another link from a different concert of a snippet of that performance.
If you’re new to Bruno Major, I definitely recommend checking out those songs, or just go ahead and listen through his whole album, A Song for Every Moon, since there’s only that one album, and it only has twelve songs!
Bruno Major // Sat Mar 03 2018 // Opener: Vessna Scheff
Johnny Brenda’s // 1201 Frankford Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19125 // (215) 739-9684