Last night, in Washington, DC, The Black Cat Backstage (the downstairs, more intimate room at the Black Cat) played host to a great night of music. Sharon Van Etten, who got such great press from NPRMusic during SXSW, opened for the North Carolina based freak folk band, Megafaun and those of us in attendance were definitely given a treat.
From the beginning of Van Etten’s set the crowd stood or sat attentively but with the standard opening-act-respectful-distance-from-stage buffer in place. That, until after the first song, Sharon cut to the chase and encouraged folks to gather close. Buffer broken, so began a well received set of original material (and one cover- see the clip below.) Van Etten’s voice shimmers in the room as she accompanies herself on a striking, red Gibson electric guitar. These, along with her strong lyrics and enchanting sense of humor as she chatted from the stage made it definitely worth arriving early to see and hear her perform.
Check out this brief clip that I shot of her covering Blaze Foley’s “Oooh Love”:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UzO01vruXU[/youtube]
Megafaun came to the stage with no announcement or fanfare and proceeded to gush about being such fans of Sharon Van Etten and how they were thrilled to have finally seen her perform. (in fact, the moment she hit the stage, the trio bounded from the backstage door and into the crowd to watch.) My setlist notes are a jumble but they leaned heavily on the most recent release, “Gather Form & Fly”. I think the opener was “Kaufman’s Ballad” which, with it’s eerie harmonies set a great tone for the night. Continue reading
