St. Vincent runs hot and cold in San Francisco
There’s plenty of evidence to suggest St. Vincent is on the verge of becoming a mainstream success story.
After all, she’s won a Grammy, collaborated with Rock and Roll Hall of Famer David Byrne and recently broke into the Billboard Top 10 for the first time with her fifth studio album, “Masseducation,” which is the altrock singer-songwriter-guitarist’s most accessible effort to date. You can even hear her songs on the radio.
But then you see her in concert and quickly realize that, well, she’s not Imagine Dragons.
And that’s fine by me, because if I have to hear that “Thunder” song one more time …
The point is that St. Vincent has no interest in charming the masses if it means compromising her artist vision. That much was perfectly clear during her concert Monday night at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco.
The 90-minute onewoman show was an alternately captivating and alienating piece of performance art. It was icy cold for large stretches, as St. Vincent (real name Annie Clark) moved robotically about the stage as she sang karaoke-style to songs from her catalog. The music was
mostly pre-recorded, with the exception (thankfully) being her always intriguing guitar work.
Still, a full live band would’ve improved things greatly and helped the whole evening feel a bit less monotonous.
The pop-art performance was structured to a fault, as if her every step and strum were designed by robo-rock computer programmers. There was occasionally great synergy to that approach, as the visuals strengthened her lyrical meditations on the human condition in the 21st century.
Mostly, however, the show failed to live up to its potential.
Sure, there were some brief, flickering moments of greatness, such as when St. Vincent appeared below a single spotlight onstage
and opened the show with a dramatic solo version of the title track of her first album, 2007’s “Marry Me.”
From there, she strapped on a guitar and proceeded to rock ’n’ roll through two sets of music, the first of which was dedicated to tracks from her first four albums. The complex electro-rock of “Now, Now” lit up the building, only to give way to the rippling guitar work of “Cruel” and then the steely-cool “Cheerleader.”
The music was distancing at times, but St. Vincent’s warm banter from the stage was the exact opposite.
“Hello, San Francisco. So, the world is on fire. But you are here tonight,” she said before playing “Digital Witness.” “The one thing I do know is there is always something to dance about.”
In general, the first set was more enjoyable than the second. And that definitely shouldn’t have been the case, since the second half was dedicated entirely to “Masseducation,” which is the best album of St. Vincent’s career.
But the show wasn’t nearly as satisfying as the album, even though, ironically, it sounded a lot like the album. One goes to a concert in hopes of seeing an artist take the material to a new level. Yet, St. Vincent refused to take us any higher.
There were a few standout numbers in the second set, as St. Vincent performed “Masseducation” from start to finish. Notably, “Happy Birthday, Johnny” was gorgeous and then there was that great tribute to the Big Apple.
“The next song very well could have been written about your fair city,” St. Vincent told the crowd as an introduction to “New York.” “It’s just that your fair city had one too many syllables. Think about changing that and then your city could have its own song, other than the Rice-A-Roni one.”
Opening the show was acclaimed Bay Area jazz duo Tuck & Patti, who also happen to be St. Vincent’s uncle and aunt.