Hip Hatchet, aka Philippe Bronchtein, is an American folk singer with a roving eye and restless spirit.
Presumably on the basis that a moving target is harder to hit, he has lived in Montreal, Vermont, New Jersey and is currently based in Portland,Oregon where he can also be found playing keyboards with the band Quiet Life.
His fourth solo album is described as his most fully orchestrated release to date and features a range of backing musicians including Scott Davis on guitar, Greg Vincent on pedal steel, Nathan Crockett on violin and Ty Bailie on hammond B3 organ & piano.
The arrangements are rich and well-crafted but it is Bronchtein's distinctive singing voice which gives these songs their character. One critic referred to it as a "mahogany baritone" and his press release praises his capacity to "meander from a whispering purr to a hardened howl".
It's a voice that is well fitted to his rustic travelling songs which advocate the pleasures of drifting with a sense of purpose. "The highway's only lonesome if you've got nowhere to go" he notes sagely on Tacoma Bound.
There's a 'take me as you find me' quality to his songs which identify him as a bullshit artist, a ladies man, a hard drinker and smooth talker. "Man, I can't commit for shit, but I can act and pretend", he confesses on the title track and on David’s Wolves admits "I've been drunk for days, not to mention nights".
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On a more considered note, there's also a implicit recognition that he's not as young as he used to be. He writes of "a fading horizon peeling away" on Ladies Night, a song that finds the artist lechering over a pretty girl as she dances with a younger guy, wondering what she sees in him.
Still, you don't get the impression he's likely to change his ways or wallow in self pity. Some of his bleakest lyrics are in Father Redemption but, as this is set to a toe-tapping hoedown beat, lines like "Keep me sober, keep me free from the devil's company" don't sound like a man on the brink of despair.
On the single ,Coward’s Luck, he recognizes "one day all this will undoubtedly dissolve" but the strength of these songs is in their stubbornly unrepentant tone.
His is the voice of sometimes bitter experience which recommends facing up to your demons rather than being cowered by them. I'll drink to that!
Hip Hatchet's website
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