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Multi-instrumentalist Shane Philip performing at Creston's Snoring Sasquatch

Shane Philip, a songwriter who expresses himself with a bunch of different instruments at the same time, plays in Creston on July 24...
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Multiinstrumentalist Shane Philip plays at the Snoring Sasquatch on July 24.

Shane Philip doesn’t like to refer to himself as a one-man band.

“I don’t like to call myself a one-man band because people think of the old guy with the cymbals between his knees and the monkey,” he said. “I’m just a songwriter who happens to express myself with a bunch of different instruments at the same time.”

Philip was born in Toronto, grew up in Ottawa, and went to university in Thunder Bay, Ont. But if you ask him where he feels most at home, and where he imagines he’ll stay for the rest of his life, he’ll say without hesitation the West Coast.

“When I go to play in Toronto, where I’m from, they tag me as a West Coast guy,” Philip said with a laugh.

The rootsy singer-songwriter — who plays at the Snoring Sasquatch on July 24, and previously closed the Creston Concert Society’s season — moved with his girlfriend and their two-and-half-year-old son to Courtenay from Quadra Island earlier this year, a switch that has paid off handsomely for Philip —in terms of his state of mind, the move to the Comox Valley has left him more refreshed than ever.

“I wanted to find a place where the mountains met the sea,” he said. “That was my dream. I was always attracted to mountains, and always wanted to be by the ocean. There was always this pull to come out west. Once I got out here, I couldn’t go back. That was the end of it.”

Philip’s journey to this point has been adventurous, to say the least.

He has lived in Banff, 100 Mile House, Smithers, Gold River, Campbell River, Nanaimo and Ladysmith, among other locales. He taught high school social studies for seven years, and raced competitively at the provincial level as a cross-country skier.

He was playing music on the side, often for his students. But creatively he felt stifled. He soon realized teaching wasn’t for the long-term. Free from the daily grind, he dove into music full-time and recorded his debut, 2005’s OM Cooking.

“It was a real snap decision,” Philip said. “I made it overnight. It was the first career decision I made that wasn’t influenced by how much money I would make. I did it trusting that money would follow, that I would be able to make a living doing it. I’ve never really been interested in trying to get rich, I just want to make a living.”

He released his second recording, Earthshake, in 2006, followed by his third effort, In the Moment, in 2008.

Barring vast changes to his setup, he will always be known as the guy with the vast artistic arsenal.

“I do have a lot of junk with me,” he said of his cache of instruments, which evolves on a regular basis. “I’m the equivalent of a five-piece band, in terms of the gear that I have. There’s a lot going on.”

Advance tickets are $12 at Black Bear Books, Buffalo Trails Coffee House and Kingfisher Used Books, and $15 at the door, which opens at 7 p.m.; the show begins at 8.

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