The first thing to come to mind when I heard Scott Helman was performing at the Bronson Centre was, “Oh, the Bungalow guy!” Back when music channels still existed on cable TV, I remember early mornings before school, watching the music video for his 2014 platinum single. Since then, the Toronto-born and raised pop singer-songwriter has been up to a lot (check out our YouTube channel for an in-depth interview with Scott from earlier that day).
“I feel like since I was last here, so much… has changed… I moved and I got engaged,” he told the audience before performing his song Back Together. “I’ve always been sort of really stressed and focused about the future… Then all of a sudden, I couldn’t stop thinking about the past… I had this friend who passed away and made me really realise that people always say be present… but I also feel like saying that kind of takes away the fact that the past and the future matter… If you’re not able to… bring all that stuff into the present, then you’re just screwed… So that’s what this tour is about for me, just being with you guys and playing music… just reconnecting, you know?”
Sofia Camara opened the show and perfectly set the scene for the reminiscent theme of the night. The 20-year-old Canadian artist bounced on stage with all the energy of a popstar. In her blue jeans, white sweater vest and ponytail, she seemed nonchalant but captivated the audience with the depth of her vocals and the honesty of her songs. While performing Here We Go Again, she had everyone in the room calling back the lyrics as loud as they could. As the background instrumentals slowly died down, it became a beautifully intimate moment of both vocal and non-vocal exchange of emotion. For everyone who could not get a ticket, she brought us a glimmer of the Eras Tour with her cover of Cruel Summer. Sofia introduced her final song by saying, “This is for all the heartbreak girlies and guys. I get it, I see you, I hear you, I’ve been there… everything’s going to be okay, I promise.” Sharing in that moment of collective heartbreak, I think each audience member found a little bit of solace that night.
As the time came for Scott’s set to start, you could feel a certain excitement in the air. Everyone was packing in, slowly transforming the room from a group of individuals to a unified being. Looking around, I was struck by the diversity of ages in the crowd. I saw little girls on their dad’s shoulders, preteens taking selfies, young adults reliving their middle school years, and older couples swaying in each other’s arms.
Then the lights dimmed, and Scott came on stage repping Ottawa in a Senator’s jersey with his name on the back. Music was no longer music; it was a heartbeat. Dancing was no longer dancing; it was breathing as one combined group. Scott’s stage presence was unreal; he jumped up and down, strumming on his guitar and shaking his hair wildly.
Despite his animated performance, his gratitude for his fans showed through. When someone yelled out that they loved him, he interrupted himself mid-song to say that he loved them back. A young girl was holding a sign exclaiming that she drove seven hours to see him. Scott paused between songs to take a selfie with her.
Between these intimate moments, he maintained his effervescent energy throughout the entirety of his set. While performing his song PDA, he grabbed the microphone off the stand and poured out raw emotions while screaming the lyrics. The charged atmosphere took a softer turn in 21 Days. I felt small in the crowd, thinking about fighting monsters in my backyard and building forts out of cardboard as a little kid. There was a beautifully crafted juxtaposition between the reality of his songs, touching topics like global warming and war, all coated with an overarching glow of teenage nostalgia.
In his song Hang Ups, I was transported to the time I was fourteen and couldn’t hang up the phone until four A.M. During House Key, I thought of when I was sixteen and spent my days romanticizing and imagining my future with a boy. Collarbone reminded me of when I struggled to look in the mirror at seventeen. Tikka was a strange experience to hear again almost a decade after it was released; now, at age twenty, I related to it in a different way. It’s a perfect soundtrack for my life as I wander through the night streets in a new city. I heard the girl behind me say, “this guy is my childhood; I love this man so much,” which beautifully articulated the emotions bubbling in the audience.
“This song isn’t really mine; it isn’t even really about me,” Scott said before performing Ripple Effect. That phrase captured the sentiment the entire night. Standing in that auditorium, I felt the communal reliving of everyone’s past as well as the shared anticipation of our future dreams. In that moment, it felt like I was living all time at once.
Review – Edie Olender
Photos – Ming Wu
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