When the panini press let up a smidge in June, when things seemed like they might actually get much better in the near future, I bought concert tickets. It started with a few artists whose tours I had anticipated following pandemic releases. Then I realized that because I’m indie, many of the shows I wanted to see were relatively cheap and in lower-capacity venues, which felt safer. I realized that live music was perhaps the thing I missed the most during the first year of the pandemic, both attending and playing shows. This playlist conveniently features a few artists whose tours I’ve attended recently or will attend soon.
I saw Sylvan Esso last night. I was working the show, but one perk of my job is that I get paid to stand at the front of the venue and look important. I’ve been doing it long enough that I’ve developed the skill of being able to vibe out while keeping a part of my brain alert enough to notice an emergency or a problem. Sometimes, if you get lucky, no such issues arise, and you pretty much just get to attend a free concert.
Sylvan Esso is a married couple. They’re very much in love, at least according to their social media presence, and the fact that they can go on tour together and maintain a romantic relationship. Its members are Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn, whose musical backgrounds couldn’t be more disparate; before they formed the band in 2013, Amelia was focused on her folk project Mountain Man and Nick was producing exclusively electronic music. They saw in each other an opportunity for something new and different, not quite like any other groups making music today.
Their songs “Hey Mami” and “Coffee” off of their first album Sylvan Esso (2014) took off and earned them enough of a fanbase to play major festivals starting the next year. There was significant pressure to make another great record, to avoid the “sophomore slump,” and produce something to cement the adoration of fans. Meath wrote “Radio” in this headspace, a song that speaks to the demands of the record industry and its impossibly high expectations for bands. Nevertheless, their album What Now (2017) received critical acclaim.
They recorded “Funeral Singers” with Collections of Colonies of Bees, who they were touring with at the time, at the Wilco studio The Loft. It’s a cover of the Califone original, a fact which I just found out today. It was one of my favorite songs of 2017 when it came out, so much more tender and stripped down than What Now.
All my friends are weeds and rain
All my friends are half-gone birds
Are magnets, all my friends are words
All my friends, all my friends are
Funeral singers
The original actually reminds me of The New Pornographers, with the two vocalists and the kind of Dinosaur Jr.-esque delivery. I would say that I saw the New Pornographers a few weeks ago at a show in Sonoma, but it was technically a Neko Case concert that A.C. Newman opened for. They played a few songs from Challengers (2007), unexpectedly and delightfully.
Neko Case is one of my favorite artists ever. I’ve seen her three times now, a record for me (Lizzo twice, Carly Rae Jepsen twice, King Princess twice). Every show I’ve been to has been magical; her voice is strong and clear and translates well to live performance. She often asks the audience not to record her, and it’s cool to see the stage without the visual obstruction of cell phones. It’s peaceful.
She did not play “Maybe Sparrow” at this show, but she did play “Hold On, Hold On” and “Margaret vs. Pauline,” my other two favorite songs from The Fox Confessor Brings the Flood (2008). It was a joy to see the band jamming out on songs that are now more than a decade old. Neko Case’s newsletter mentions how touring is a bewildering and lovely experience, new every time. That freshness was apparent in the performance.
This Friday, I’m driving down to southern California to see HAIM play at the Santa Barbara Bowl. They’re only playing one show in the U.S. this year, and as I pressed the “Complete Purchase” button, I thought to myself, “If I don’t see ‘Gasoline’ live sometime soon, I might die.” That was months ago, and this week that dream might come to fruition. Wish me luck.