The CLUAS Archive: 1998 - 2011

11

Feist (live in Tripod, Dublin)

Leslie Feist liveReview Snapshot: After months of anticipation Miss Leslie Feist finally arrives to an overheated and cramped, but extremely expectant audience. Was it worth the wait? Only if Canadians make consistently bad music... (that's a yes).

The Cluas Verdict? 8.5 out of 10

Full Review:
Showing magnificent control over her wonderfully dry vocals, Feist hits Dublin with a bang and a banjo on a viciously cold Tuesday night. Unfortunately the sold out crowd turn Tripod into a sauna of sorts. I get the feeling that if this was a London show the guest list would be populated with names more suited to gossip pages.

With a natural confidence and a gifted band that are three quarters siblings, she glides through the set with banter and audience choral experiments. After giving excuses as to why this is her first Irish gig, she belts through a set consisting mainly of Let it Die and the superior The Reminder. Of the many highlights of the evening the twinkle-lit ‘I Feel it All’, ‘Gatekeeper’, the irrepressibly colourful ‘1234’ which makes you want to dance like this and grab your fellow man in a tryst of platonic love (at least that’s what it makes me feel) followed by ‘Mushaboom’ the modern pop anthem that is known mostly through television ads.

Of the songs that I was not aware of, they added to the spectacle of the night and as a great introduction to more of her work (most people still believe she has released only two albums, she has in fact four). Particularly delicious was the Nina Simone classic ‘Sea Lion Woman’, which acts as a brisk retort to those that insist that contemporary music has nothing to offer that cannot compare to the days of yore are simply wrong.

To improve upon Simone is no mortal feat but the dirty guitar lick that Feist introduces to the song is simply mesmeric. Whilst she shines through someone else’s original music, Feist weaves her own sonic image to her own capable abilities. Here’s to POD getting her back for some more in future.

Daire Hall


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