September 5, 2007
Sara Bareilles Concert Review
Let's make this short and sweet: Sara Bareilles is incredible. Not only do we love her rich yet effortless voice, but her clever music is indeed what pop music needs right now. We don't need another bubble-gum star who masks their voice through electronic mechanisms, or wears little or no clothes while shaking their ass on MTV (Not that we don't appreciate an ass shaking -- we just don't need another one.) See, Bareilles can actually sing (and she's pretty damn good at it too) and she plays the piano to boot. This singer/songwriter has found her niche in the music world and her fans love her (as was proof with her sell-out engagement at Great American Music Hall on Friday night.) Bareilles was so surprised by the amount of enthusiastic fans -- at one point the crowd sang an entire chorus of her recent hit, "Love Song," -- she said, "I can't believe this. This has never happened to me before. This is incredible." Incredible it was. Not because of us, but because of her.
With the addition of a three other band members Bareilles started the evening out strong with her wishful song, "Vegas" about following her dreams, which seem to be coming true. With her debut album, Little Voices, reaching #1 on iTunes, Bareilles couldn't believe her instant success, going on to say, "It was amazing. It was not expected since we didn't have any radio play. I wasn't out there at all so it was a total surprise that it happened. It's really been cool and has even gotten better from there."
With an hour set, Bareilles was able to explore several songs off her well-received album though she missed one of my favorites, "Between the Lines." More importantly, was that her songs (with the added energy of the band) sounded new and fresh and not rehearsed and forced like some of her peers. Her performance is seamless, and at times we caught ourselves mesmerized by her. (Fine, let's admit it: we have a crush on her.)
Some of the highlights of the concert was her quirky adaptation of several fairy tales in "Fairy Tale" (which you can see here) and the haunting, "City." The evening ended with just Bareilles on her piano singing "Gravity," easily the best song of the night. But we walked away wanting more: an hour show wasn't long enough, not for this kind of talent.
By Spencer Williams
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Never heard of her, but I'm on board after checking out some of her Youtube footage. Talented singer, smart songwriter, easy on the eyes, and humble too? Good find, SFist!
Yeah, Sara was great and the audience really did respond to her. It is really refreshing to see a talented young musician who hasn't let fame go to her head like some of the rather talentless tabloid pop tarts.
She's a NorCal gal (Humboldt County) who attended UCLA; opening act Raining Jane are UCLA pals (she mentions them in the liner notes of "Little Voice"). The bassist dude was new, but Josh Day (drummer) and Javier Dunn (guitar) have been around for a while.
She's something special.
Sara and I actually went to high school together in Eureka -- she sung the national anthem at a Dodger's baseball game in LA when she was about 12 and it got better from there. The hour-long limitation was the only downside of having her co-headline with Jon McLaughlin -- who I thought was also in top form. She's pretty fantastic!
I forgot to mention how fantastic Raining Jane was as well. They were awesome. Definitely interested in checking out their album.
I was too late to buy tickets to the full blown concert, but I did see her at the Virgin Megastore performance on Saturday. She was definitely hitting the notes ... and what great lyrics. She's the first person I've started stalking, I mean "following," on Twitter.
These types of ex post "I like this/that" posts annoy the hell out of me. They're completely irrelevant to what I check SFist for.
Personally, and no offense to Spencer Williams, I don't give a shit what Spencer Williams thinks about a band I've never heard of. Or what he thinks about what pop music thinks right now. If he has something to say about the City, or one of its multitudinous and enrapturing peculiarities, or - hell - a concert that's COMING UP, go for it. Otherwise, send him on over to stereogum, or pitchfork, or tinymixtapes, or any number of perfectly well-suited music blogs.
Before posting the next one, ask yourself: Is there any chance of seeing "Spencer Williams likes _______" in "This Week in the Ists"?
Harsh, don't you think? Obviously, there are some people who do appreciate the "I like this/that" posts. See above.
Besides, how is your "I don't like 'I like this'" comment any more "relevant?"
I was there!
She was fantastic, and I'd never even heard of her. I was there to see Jon McLaughlin, the opener, who I thought was also really good. Sara kinda stole the show though.
No, I don't think it's particularly harsh. My comment wasn't directed at Spencer but for his being the example of what annoys me closest to hand. Sorry if you took it personally, Spencer. It was a well-written expression of your opinion.
And I do think it's relevant: I'm making a case for a particular view of content management. This kind of "me first" web 2.0 bullshit is annoying and would be better suited for a facebook post; and, more importantly, it has nothing to do with San Francisco. You know, San Francisco: The City we're all here to read about.
But I hear that Raining Jane was fantastic. And that will certainly figure into my later ruminations on the subject.
This is really about the creep of sites like SFist towards traditional editorial media and vice-versa.
In the good ol' days, traditional media would say, "Our staff has determined that Sara Bareilles is newsworthy and we have produced an official opinion of her performance. There will be no further public discussion of this topic."
Meanwhile, blogs would say, "Hey dudes, what do you think is newsworthy? Got an opinion? Let's talk about it or something. Ok, cool."
Now, SFGate and SFist work in exactly the same way: editorial staff provides a story, readers can comment.
Granted, commenting is a more central part of the experience on SFist and editorial content is more central to SFGate. But they'll inevitably converge and meet somewhere in the middle. It's a natural progression from both sides.
SFGate needs to change with the times and drive page views as print newspapers die a slow death.
Meanwhile, SFist's has a growing audience and is becoming an influential news outlet. So they need to produce more and more content to continue growth, while coming to terms with their newfound status as legit, professional journalists. (At least that's my conjecture.)
So the downside is that we're stuck with Spencer Williams' opinion. The upside is that we get to publicly tell him that his opinion is totally gay.
@haplito:
Raining Jane is indeed a great band. They tour heavily, so chances are they will be back in the Bay Area in the not-too-distant future. Two of the band members have roots here (Mona the percussionist is from San Jose and Chaska the guitarist grew up in the Santa Cruz Mountains) and their local shows have tons of friends and family in attendance (it's quite cute, actually).
I enjoyed their set at GAMH, particularly because they played newer, unreleased material. I don't recall hearing anything from their last release, "Diamond Lane".
#10 - Thanks for the useful criticism....very helpful.
#6 & #9 - Not sure as why you have such a hard time with reading something on Sfist that happened in SF.
Just transferring from Phillyist to Sfist - I've realized that there is much more "audience" participation on this site (which is weird because my experience with the East was that they are way more vocal).
So yes #10 - you are stuck with me
If you read the other -ists sites, you will realize that several, if not most of the -ists publish reviews of shows weekly and even CD reviews. (Check out laist for there most recent CD review: http://laist.com/2007/09/04/cd_review_small.php)
#9 - Didn't take it personally. And I guess after everyone of my posts you can tell us how much you hate them. That sounds awesome.
Glad that #1, 2, 3, 5 and 8 enjoyed the post.
Oh - one other thing.
#6 - My "I like this..." post has shown up in "This Week in the -Ists"
Check it out here:
http://phillyist.com/2007/05/13/across_the_ista_15.php
Again, again, again: Accepting the sad realities of the world is no way to build a better one.