The Tallest Man on Earth

Usher Hall, Edinburgh

“I DEFINITELY didn’t start this because I felt I needed to be looked at,” said Kristian Mattson, aka The Tallest Man Alive, of this very minimal and personality-focused live experience, “but I like it when things are weird.” In the UK neither Mattson’s real name nor his alter-ego may be described as of the “household” variety, yet his audience is as devoted as they come.

The 36-year-old began his career as The Tallest Man Alive in the mid-2000s, making an impression in his native Sweden at first, and then catching on in the UK and America through the approval of such outlets as Later… with Jools Holland and hipster music website Pitchfork. On the live stage he bore the raw energy of youth, stamping and strutting across the stage as he hollered lyrics and hit the strings of his electricguitar,oftenendingthe song in a contained crouch, as though physically willing the song into submission.

Yet his voice is timeless in its evocation of hard-won maturity, ringing with a sense of internal and external battles fought and won; more Woody Guthrie than Bob Dylan. His songs are steeped in classic and contemporary Americana, from The Running Styles of New York to the a cappella Moonshiner,whichwassomewhat annoyingly accompanied by just one noisy audience member.

His voice soared into falsetto amid Like the Wheel, was accompanied by his own rudimentary piano – he’s still learning, apparently – on Little Nowhere Towns, and bore revelatory power on Waiting for My Ghost. Over two hours it was a somewhat one-note show, but that note was beautifully struck.