Most of the tributes to Philip Chevron, who died earlier this week, described him as "guitarist with the Pogues", which is true but somewhat reductive. He was also a songwriter of some note as Thousands Are Sailing and Faithful Departed by the Pogues attest. As does Kitty Ricketts by his early punk band, The Radiators, released in 1979 with vocals by the Dublin-based chanteuse, Agnes Bernelle.
Chevron and Bernelle were soulmates. He produced her strange and haunting album, Father's Lying Dead on the Ironing Board (1985), which is well worth seeking out for its Brechtian lyrics and Chevron's restrained but muscular musical settings which perfectly complemented her often eccentric delivery. The song Chansonette has one of the great opening verses: "There are warts on the body of my blue-blooded lord/ And the sight of a skirt sends him screwy/ Fathers lying dead on the ironing board/ And he reeks of Lux and Drambuie."
A melancholy trawl of YouTube also led me to Philip's stirring rendition of Brendan Behan's scathing satirical song The Captains and the Kings from 1983, a sophisticated critique of colonialism and empire.
Reading on mobile? Hear the song here
"By the moon that shines above us in the misty morning night
Let us cease to run ourselves down and praise God that we are white
And better still we're English, tea and toast and muffin rings
And old ladies with stern faces and the captains and the kings..."
For me, The Captains and the Kings remains Philip's finest moment. Co-produced by Elvis Costello and arranged by David Bedford, it is a thing of complex beauty and anger. So, as well as "guitarist with the Pogues", he was also a sophisticated songwriter, producer, musical director and interpreter. He was also entertaining and erudite company, with an extraordinary wide-ranging knowledge of literature and music. Remember him this way, too.
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