In any other context, they would call this revival! A wild belle singing songs of worship and wonder in a chapel packed to the rafters with a diverse crowd of beautiful people in rapture at songs such as ‘Talk To The Lord’ and ‘I Will Praise You’. This is Natalie Bergman at Union Chapel.
Who? If you don’t already know, you need to know. Following three albums with Wild Belle, her debut solo album, Mercy, was a Gospel album written and recorded in response to the tragic death of her father and stepmother in a road traffic accident. Begun on retreat at a monastery, its lithe, light, luscious rhythms lift the listener from the valley of the shadow of death to the goodness and mercy found in the house of the Lord forever.
If Mercy equates to the direct songs of praise and witness found on Bob Dylan’s Gospel albums, then her latest release, My Home Is Not In This World, equates to those later Dylan albums (like Infidels, Oh Mercy, Time Out of Mind and Rough and Rowdy Ways) where faith infuses songs exploring life and love. Bergman has quoted T Bone Burnett’s distinction between songs about the light and songs about what you can see from the light. Mercy is the former and My Home Is Not In This World, the latter.
As a result, tonight, she takes us down paths of sorrow into the wilderness to find the light of God shining on us. At Union Chapel, a series of subtly lit arches ascend behind her and her band guiding our eyes upward until they reach the central back-lit rose window. The beauty of that light is where she takes us through the soulful spirituality of her songs. By the end, the joint is jumping with joy as we sing and dance to ‘Keep Those Teardrops From Falling’.
Why? Her super-melodic songs draw inspiration from the deep sources of sixties soul, including Motown, while being infused also with the rhythms of reggae and highlife. Her voice ranges from childlike wonder floating on a sea of sound to smoky sultry spirituality. In common with Nick Cave on Wild God, the source of her spirituality is a vulnerability and openness occasioned by the grief she has endured, an experience common to all of us, whether now or in the future.
She has explained simply and clearly how it happened: “When I began writing, I had already lost the greatest love I’ve ever had, so I had nothing else to lose. I went for it. I sang from the depths of my sorrow and I witnessed a little light while doing so.” As she concludes, “How could anyone have a problem with someone processing grief in a harmless way?” At Union Chapel, it’s clear that they don’t. Instead, what resonated with Bergman in her loss, also resonates with us.
‘Talk To The Lord’ quotes Psalm 23 – ‘Though I walk in shadows, I won't be afraid / I will fear no evil / For You walk with me’ – in order to state that:
‘When you are scared, reach out your hand
Talk to the Lord, talk to the Lord
If you are sad, He'll dry your tears
Talk to the Lord, talk to the Lord’
In ‘I Will Praise You’, she says ‘When I'm broken, I will sing Your name’, while ‘Shine Your Light On Me’ also quotes Psalm 23 in a prayer for light as she cries like a ‘mourning dove’ for her ‘greatest love’. ‘Paint The Rain’ documents difficult days but discovers that:
‘In this pain, you make me sing
When I am blue, you take me in
My little ways, they feel strange
You give me a little bit, and you take it away
You paint the rain’
In these ways, she has been enabled to live again and to find joy in family life, with My Home Is Not In This World finding its inspiration in the birth of her son, Arthur. When not lamenting lost loves, My Home Is Not In This World is grounded in the realities of home and natural life. The song ‘My Home Is Not In This World’ contrasts a prior life of glitzy glamour – her home no longer being there - with the life she has now found:
‘My home
My home is not in this world
My home
My home is not in this world
I want to go outside
Tell the trees that I love them
Open my eyes
See the children in the garden
Dancing underneath the sunshine
Swinging underneath the moonlight
Sing away your sorrow my little one’
It’s been said that her ‘greatest achievement is choosing to go against the grain’, a decision that includes her spiritual focus and proves the value of going counter to the culture. It’s also been said that her universal music ‘lives in the hearts and minds and souls of her fellow travelers; born again believers in love, joy, and music’s role as guiding light and lightning rod’. That was certainly the case at Union Chapel where she ‘let the sunshine in’ and we all experienced the everlasting light of love shining on us.
