FEATURE:
Groovelines
PHOTO CREDIT: Phil Sharp for Loud and Quiet
Nadine Shah – Twenty Things
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THIS track is from an album…
PHOTO CREDIT: Suki Dhanda/The Guardian
that should have won awards. 2024’s Filthy Underneath is the latest album from Nadine Shah. I was shocked it did not win awards! Such an acclaimed album, I thought sure it would be shortlisted for the Mercury Prize. An artist who has not received as many honours as she deserves. I think Filthy Underneath is Shah’s best albums. If Topless Mother, its lead single, is my favourite song from the album, I think the one that hits hardest and you feel should have been nominated for awards is Twenty Things. In fact, I am going to start out with a feature from The Line of Best Fit from earlier in the year. Nadine Shah selecting her very best tracks. Twenty Things was among them:
“This is a very honest song; it must have been hard to write.
I’m very upset I didn't get an Ivor for that one! I know it sounds crude, but it’s my proudest work to date. It’s a collage of portraits of people that I met and loved when I was in rehab.
I don't know if there’s any truth in that you write better when you're sober because you have more clarity, I also don't want to encourage people to think that you must be inebriated or under the influence of something in order to be creative. I don't think there's a rule to be honest with you. Who knows?
I just so happened to be sober and to be writing about the people who were around me at that time. I never wrote as much as I did when I was in there. You had to keep a diary, it was a page a day, and you had to hand it in at the end of each day. I think a lot of that was safeguarding, so they could tell how people's mental health state was that day.
The nurses would read it on an evening to see if they had to look out for somebody, but getting into the routine of doing that, that practice is something that I still do. I also kept a separate little diary when I was in there, I'm sure they wouldn't have cared at all, and I was writing about the people around me. I started to write my sad little poems again. I really loved everybody in there, and there was only so much I could pack into that one song, but there's a few lines that I'm really happy exist in song form.
When I sing live, sometimes I’ll float off somewhere else, thinking about very mundane things, about what I'm going to eat when I get home, but I'm always very present in that song whilst singing it. It was meant to be a celebration, it might be quite macabre, and I don't know how other people would take it, but to me, it's a celebration of those people.
Even when things are incredibly hard, seeing the joy in things is really important, my Mum always told me that. Otherwise, you turn into Morrissey.
100%, especially in rehab. A lot of us had made attempts on our own life, had lost family, people were estranged from their sons and daughters and in really desperate situations, painfully sad situations, but I've never laughed as much in my life or met a funnier bunch of people than I did in that place.
The whole time I was in there I did have this deep desire of ‘we should sneak in some booze and see what happens, because this would be a riot, if you're like this sober, we'll have one heck of a party.’ There’s a gallows humour to the song, and I found a lot of that in there, the ability to be able to talk about the darkest things in your life, and then the next minute you’re belly laughing about something else.
It was a great opportunity that not many people are afforded to have. I ended up being there for three months. I was meant to go four weeks, I was going to escape at week two. But I could see it was doing a really good job, that I was on some kind of recovery, and then I wanted to stay for three months, and I did, and then I didn't want to leave.
What happened then?
They made me leave, you can very quickly become institutionalised in those places, and it was very expensive. I didn't have any grants or government help, I had money from friends and family, and that's why I'm saying it was a very privileged thing to be able to do.
To have that time to really shut off everything else, not having to worry about what you eat that day, doing your shopping, everything's decided for you, and when do you ever get an opportunity like that in life? To properly work on yourself for a concentrated amount of time like that, it's a real luxury, and I'm very grateful for it.
I think that's why that song's always going to be really important to me, because even if it’s quite a down lyric, to me it's reminiscent of that time, which was pretty radical”.
How painful it must have been to write Twenty Things. But it is such a meaningful song. And Nadine Shah came through it and is still with us. It is a song that is very personal to her, though it will also resonate with so many other people. Even if you have not been in rehabilitation or institutionalised or suffered a breakdown or addiction crisis, there are lines from the song that can apply to other struggles and demons. I think lines such as “The shame is awesome but its fleeting/Gets seen to with a beating” are so raw and vivid. Though you can apply them to different situations and people. I know Nadine Shah would have received messages from people who heard Twenty Things and it would have helped them. I have seen her perform live (at the 02 Forum Kentish Town last summer) and, when she is on stage, Shah is completely immersed in the music. She is such a powerful stage presence. Performing a song like Twenty Things to a huge audience. Keeping composed and strong but also ensuring the performance is convincing or natural. If Twenty Things recalls a painful and tough time, there must be catharsis in seeing it come out as a song. Going through rehab and leaving sturdier than she was before, I wonder what her relationship is with the track a few years or so since it was released as a single. When interviewed by The Guardian, Shah talked about rehab and what that experience was like:
“She is writing a memoir about her time in rehab because there are so few accounts of it by women. “I was ashamed about being there,” she says. “There was shame in being a woman who was an addict, whereas male musicians might have been revered for it. One of the reasons we can’t get many women into recovery is because of the stigma.” I mention Amy Winehouse; Shah was briefly friends with her. “She was ridiculed so awfully,” says Shah, but “she was an unwell person”.
Shah describes her experience of rehab as “beautiful”. “I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so much in my life as I did in that place,” she says. They had a sports day: “I won every race. People there were so ill they could hardly walk, never mind run.”
It was also liberating to be off social media. “You’re not searching your own name,” she says. “We played parlour games. I did a lot of Zumba. I also learned how to pick locks. There are a lot of criminals in there.”
But many of the people she befriended in rehab are now dead. She pays tribute to them on the single, Twenty Things: “I didn’t realise I was gonna fall in love with everybody,” she says”.
PHOTO CREDIT: Phil Sharp
Twenty Things was released as a single on 23rd November, 2023. I want to end with an interview from Loud and Quiet, where Nadine Shah spoke about Filthy Underneath. I have highlighted the question regarding Twenty Things. It is such an outrage that it was not the recipient of loads of awards. It is one of the most potent and unforgettable songs I have heard in years. I do believe that she has a book coming out called Critically Acclaimed, Sort of Famous, though the release date seems to be 2030, so there is a bit of a wait. Busy with acting and, let’s hope, writing new music, Shah is one of our greatest human beings:
“JW: On ‘Twenty Things’, it’s clear that you were able to bond with the other residents, to reflect upon their stories alongside your own. As a lyricist, how do you strike this balance of writing about other people without overstepping?
NS: It’s definitely called Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous for a reason. These are very vulnerable people who I came to love and care about deeply, which is something I didn’t realise when I went into that place. I was scared of the people I was going to meet. I hadn’t met, you know, heroin addicts before, or criminals – some people in there chose rehab over prison. But all I did was fall in love with everybody, and unfortunately, nobody warned me of how many of them I was going to lose. My three best friends from there are now dead, and I wasn’t prepared for that.
But then it was also a real privilege to walk and sleep and eat amongst those people. I’ve never laughed so much in my life as I did in that place. I can’t speak for everyone, but a lot of us had been through similar things, really harrowing circumstances, and all of a sudden you’re in a space where you’re safe, being looked after, cooked for. It makes room for a lot of joy, in a weird way, and room to be childlike together. So I wanted to write about some of the experiences of those people, without giving away too much. I think if anybody knows anything about my past career, I’m not going to stop talking about stuff that I’m passionate about, and advocating for people in addiction will be something that I do speak about, trying to ensure that we have the properly funded avenues available to people from all walks of life”.
I wanted to shine a light on Twenty Things for this Groovelines by bringing in words from Nadine Shah herself. Arguably her most personal or toughest song to write, it was not all such a painful expired being in rehab. I remember when she posted a tweet when it seemed like she would take her own life, and there was such shock and panic from people. As a big fan of hers, it was a really hard thing to absorb! Luckily, this incredible songwriter is in the world and doing such wonderful things. An army of fans and people with her that show such love and support, things a lot better for Nadine Shah. Living away from London and the South and in a happy relationship, she is currently appearing in King Lear at Manchester’s Royal Exchange. Shah is playing Goneril. It started on Friday (2nd October), so I have not read any reviews yet, though Shah is a terrific actor. So I will keep my eyes open. Twenty Things is a song that deserved awards, but I think the way it helped or connected with people is significant. Written by the remarkable and goddess-like Nadine Shah, this is someone who we are…
VERY lucky to have in the world.