David Duchovny
20th February 2018
Powerstation, Auckland, New Zealand.
Review by Sarah Kidd. Photography by Doug Peters.
When most people first hear the name David Duchovny images of the X-Files (Fox Mulder), Californication (Hank Moody) or, if you are that way inclined, Jake Winters (Red Shoe Diaries) come to mind. But on his first trip to New Zealand, Duchovny is not here due to his acting, but due to his musical capabilities.
Yes that’s right. Musical.
Duchovny – who recently released his sophomore album entitled Every Third Thought is a singer/songwriter and not a bad one at that. Arriving to a rather modest crowd – that to be perfectly honest, were predominantly made up of women, many of them who became quite shrill when it came to Duchovny even looking their way – Duchovny cut a polite figure in simple blue jeans and an off white, long-sleeved cotton t-shirt. Accompanied by a five piece band (who go by the name of Weather, and are all Berklee-trained musicians) Duchovny wasted no time in getting straight into his first track entitled ‘Every Third Thought.’ Singing in an octave slightly lower than his day to day speaking voice, it is pleasant and rather soothing; however it is also noticeable that singing is not something that comes naturally to Duchovny, in fact by his own admission, he has been taking singing lessons.
And right here ladies and gentlemen, lies within the beauty of the entire show. Duchovny’s performance tonight is genuine. It is honest and earnest and comes from a place within him that does not require him to put on a persona, take the form of a character or even dress up like a woman (Twin Peaks anyone?). This evening is like looking through the window and seeing the real thing.
“Thank you Auckland” Duchovny’s first spoken words to the audience met with shrieks of devotion from a number in the front row “Took a long time to get here, well for me it took fifty years…” that small smile curling the corner of his mouth eliciting laughter from the crowd. There is a self-deprecating sense to Duchovny, throughout the set he often makes jokes about requiring help with the lyrics, or just singing in general. One gets the impression that in some ways that beneath the exterior of Hollywood celebrity is just a quiet dude who wants to get it right.
With only two albums under his belt (other musicians have certainly toured on less) Duchovny gives us a mix from both; his first album Hell or Highwater certainly being more well known amongst his fans who are here because of his music. ‘3000’ his second song into the set sees him begin to relax a little more, small stage moves begin to enter his performance. At times some come off as slightly awkward, as if he is still a little unsure of himself despite the fact he has been performing in a musical capacity for quite awhile now. Others see him lost in his own words and music.
As a vocalist he is pleasurable, there is a Leonard Cohen / Warren Zevon aspect to him, unsurprising really when he has stated that he is a big fan of Zevon. His songs at some points are rather more of the spoken word variety and it works well for him, especially in the moments when he places his head back, closes his eyes and forgets we are there. His backing band are certainly good quality as well, and while they remain in a half circle around the outer edge, supporting but never really intruding on Duchovny’s performance save for the occasional guitar solo provided by Pat or beautiful slide guitar by Tom. A cover of The Band’s ‘The Weight’ gave those in the crowd who were not completely up to speed with his musical work a chance to sing along, both Pat and Tom providing some rather impressive vocal work themselves. Duchovny reveled in the moment, a more relaxed look of joy playing across his face as he encouraged everyone to sing along.
There was the slight threat of being toppled over however as Duchovny decided to step out onto the risers side of stage, causing a mini stampede of women to hurtle towards him in the hope of brushing his hand for a few precious seconds with theirs.
With often informative little introductions to each of the tracks, we were given insights into Duchovnys thought processes, many of the songs often based around love and loss and hopes of forgiveness. ‘Roman Coin’ in particular seeming to be a track that means much to Duchovny; it’s conclusion prompting him to ask the crowd “Isn’t all love priceless and worthless?” As a few shyly answered yes, he smiled sadly and replied “I don’t need you to say yes, I know it’s true.” But this was the only truly melancholy moment, as Duchovny and co picked up the pace and dropped some particularly rocky numbers on the crowd, ‘Mo’ seeing Duchovny pretend to slow dance on stage and then look down at the crowd as if to say ‘you should be doing the same’, which indeed a few couples did.
By the time he rolled around to a particularly lovely wee number entitled ‘Let it Rain’, his t-shirt was rather drenched, prompting a few ‘Take it off’ cat calls from the crowd. “Suddenly I feel unsafe” Duchovny laughed, the audience enjoying the moment of his face lighting up with that smile many have come to know and love. With a mix of cowbell (yes Duchovny plays rather the mean cowbell), humour and more than listenable music, this evening was really quite special. Special not for the fact that it was outstanding in the form of a concert; Duchovny won’t be winning any music awards anytime soon… But special for the fact that it made you feel as if you were being gifted a part of someone’s inner thoughts and workings. We were being entrusted with something that holds a lot of weight with Duchovny, and that is something that many here will forever treasure.
Following calls for an encore the “tiny but mighty” audience as Duchovny had referred to them earlier were treated to a three song encore that included an outstanding cover of the Crowded House track ‘Don’t Dream It’s Over’ sung by the very talented keyboardist Colin Lee (whose very proud parents were standing in the audience). Having produced Duchovny’s first album there is an obvious connection between the two; the song itself seeing the room burst into colour, Duchovny taking a moment to sit on the drum riser and sip his orange juice as he took it all in.
Closing the night on ‘Positively Madison Avenue’ again from his first album and Duchovny waved goodbye, the audience genuinely applauding him, many with smiles a mile wide.
Let’s hope it’s not the last that we have seen of David Duchovny.
Were you there at the Powerstation for this classic style rock gig? Or have you seen David Duchovny perform live somewhere else before? Tell us about it in the comments below!
Setlist:
- Every Third Thought
- 3000
- Maybe I Can’t
- Stranger
- The Things
- The Weight [The Band cover]
- When The Whistle Blows
- Roman Coin
- Passenger
- Mo
- Let It Rain
- Hell Or Highwater
- Half Life
- Spiral [encore]
- Don’t Dream It’s Over [Crowded House cover] [encore]
- Positively Madison Avenue [encore]
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