Alternative rock

‘Can I have a photo with you, please?’ It’s the most embarrassing question you can ask of someone you’re interviewing. But I had to. Not only because Evan Dando is one of my favourite songwriters. But also – vainly – because years of on-off drug addiction (mostly on) mean Dando is no longer quite the beautiful young man he was when he became famous in the early 1990s. Back then, I’d have looked like a troll standing next to him. Now, not so much. It was a night of beautiful imperfection – the kind that feels truer than a thousand arena shows He still, however, looks better than he has any right to, and in the evening he proved that he sounded better than I had dared to hope. Better still, he was fully present – not just physically, but mentally and emotionally.

Unsurprisingly, David Berman hated his dad. When he broke up his band, the Silver Jews, in 2009 he released a statement which announced: 'My father is a despicable man. My father is a sort of human molestor [sic].  'An exploiter. A scoundrel. A world historical motherfucking son of a bitch. (sorry grandma)' Obviously, Berman felt as if the sins of the father had tainted the son. 'This winter,' he wrote, 'I decided that the [Silver Jews] were too small of a force to ever come close to undoing a millionth of all the harm he has caused.' He swore to seek justice by other means. Apparently, this involved writing a book but it never materialized and Berman all but disappeared for about a decade. Berman reappeared in 2019, with a gorgeous album, Purple Mountains, and plans to tour.