The truly great performances, the ones that stick with us, are fueled not by style or light shows or even guitar solos. They may feature guitars, or crowds full of hard-to-please hipsters, or sometimes no crowds at all. What really constitutes a great show is a factor harder to pinpoint and almost impossible to describe to someone who hasn’t witnessed it for themselves. Those great shows are fed by the musician’s almost palpable need to perform, as if the music can provide some sort of inner release of kinetic energy that had been threatening to blow a fuse for some time.
Such was the case when waif-ey blues goddess Fiona Apple paid a visit to the Wang Theatre on Saturday night in support of first new album in seven years, The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do.
Apple sang as if the Devil himself were yipping at her heels, howling and crooning and banging on the piano keys during angry lover-scorned ballad “Not About Love” from 2005’s Extraordinary Machine. The singer-songwriter happily ran through most of her old popular material in addition to the Idler Wheel standouts like “Werewolf” and “Anything We Want,” much to the enjoyment of the audience (many of whom, it seemed, could have been a part of the “Free Fiona” movement of the early 2000’s, the super-fans who sent apples to Sony execs demanding the release of Extraordinary Machine).
In a recent interview with Pitchfork, Apple commented on the experience of performing these older songs, many of them desolate ballads like 1996’s “Carrion” or angry blues anthems like 1996’s “Fast as You Can”.
Apple: It occurred to me when I was making this album that I f*cked myself by writing all those songs when I was angry and hurt. Now, in order to live, I must rehash these memories all the time. Once the song starts, it’s as though you have gotten drunk and you can’t help it. The room just starts spinning. But you wake up later and you’re fine; when I come out of the song, I’m out of it.
It seemed that Apple’s audience had taken in that drunkenness as well on Saturday night: a quick look of the rows around me showed fans of all kinds, eyes closed, softly singing along, and a few even shedding tears. Although the theatre sold out its 3600 or so seats, the performance felt as though Apple had invited us into her living room for drinks and an intimate gathering around the grand piano. During the guitar solo of her final song before the encore, 1996’s standout hit, “Criminal”, Apple crouched down on the stage, swaying and pulsating facedown on the ground, overwhelmed by the force of the music, and afterwards, she summed up the experience for all of us, breathlessly shouting into the microphone, “That was f*cking fun.” Couldn’t agree more, Fiona. Couldn’t agree more
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