Review + Photos: Joanna Newsom at the Herbst Theatre
Joanna Newsom (photo: Jon Bauer) Multi-instrumentalist Joanna Newsom performed two sold-out nights last week at the Herbst Theatre, showcasing her talents and unique style to a passionate crowd ready to appreciate the artist's live show. It was one of the few sporadic residencies the singer has done in the past year, and the Bay was lucky to be graced with Newsom returning home to perform. Our photographer Jon Bauer has the excellent gallery from the night below for you to check out.
Joanna Newsom adds California dates to ‘Strings/Keys Incident’
Photo by Annabel Mehran It's been nearly seven years since Joanna Newsom premiered Divers single "Sapokanikan" at Treasure Island Music Festival in San Francisco, the last time I saw her perform. The Bay Bridged was also there for her most recent Oakland show at the Fox Theater in 2016. A couple of months ago, Joanna Newsom announced that she would be returning to the stage after a three-year touring hiatus. The special mini-tour was dubbed "The Strings/Keys Incident" and will feature Newsom performing solo vocals, harp, and piano in select, intimate spaces. Initially, the only stops listed were [...]
Photos & Review: Joanna Newsom raised my standards for reality at The Fox Theater
Joanna Newsom (photo: Jon Bauer) Joanna Newsom feels more myth than mortal. She's an idiosyncratic elf-esque harpist whose voice comes across as a caricature of a British nanny, yet she sold out a venue as large as the Fox Theater well in advance for a completely seated show this past Sunday. Cultural critics in both the mainstream and underground respect her, yet she’s altogether removed from the usual fare either covers. She performs in elegant ball gowns on stage, yet is as capable of razing rock and roll as she is of tender folk. I’ve just never considered Joanna Newsom as [...]
Thao & The Get Down Stay Down – "Kindness be Conceived" (with Joanna Newsom)
San Francisco folk-rocker Thao Nguyen and her band The Get Down Stay Down have a sparkly new album by the name of We the Common, out February 5th. We've already heard some early tracks, "We the Common (for Valerie Bolden)" and "Holy Roller," but the latest to surface is a much-anticipated collaboration with freak-folk wunderkind Joanna Newsom (who also dwelled in the Bay Area for a time, little-known tidbit). The clip-clop acoustic tune, "Kindness be Conceived," is simplistic, lighthearted, and gorgeously harmonized (the combination of their voices is almost Feist-esque). The track seems to declare an equal mix of Nguyen and Newsom, with Thao's [...]
Philip Glass, Joanna Newsom to host Henry Miller Library benefit show at The Warfield on 6/25/12
June 25th brings a special night of music to The Warfield, as composer extraordinaire Philip Glass teams up with Joanna Newsom and Tim Fain for a benefit show to support Big Sur's historic Henry Miller Memorial Library. Pre-sale starts this Wednesday at 12pm with tickets available at FolkYeah.com, and the general public on-sale is this Friday at 10am here. Located in a setting rivaled only by the musical talent that's graced its stage, the Library has become a premier destination for top performers from all over the world (in-depth list here). Recently, however, the Library was told they must modernize [...]
Mixtape: Twenty Years of Noise Pop (Podcast #269)
Mixtape: Twenty Years of Noise Pop (Podcast #269) In February, the Noise Pop Music Festival turns twenty by gathering over one hundred local and touring bands from across the indie spectrum for a week of exciting concerts all over the City. Two decades of championing independent music is an accomplishment worth celebrating, and this mixtape collects twenty bands that have performed at Noise Pop events in years past. As you'll hear, a whole bunch of big names graced Noise Pop bills before achieving fame, as past festivals hosted early performances by bands like Spoon, Death Cab for Cutie and Mates [...]
Best of 2010: Scott McDowell on Joanna Newsom
The album I’ve listened to more than any other in 2010 may barely qualify as local, but that’s just how it is. I listened to Joanna Newsom’s Have One On Me (Drag City) almost every day until I felt sick. After a month off, I’m back to three listens each week. It feels like this is the music I’ve been waiting my whole life to hear, I just didn’t know until I heard it. This record has so much open space. When it needs to get dense, it does, but without ever feeling cluttered. The instruments are mixed so gently [...]
Sade Sundays: That’s How I Remember It, Season Finale (Best of 2010).
Part One: Michael Tapscott 1. Kanye West – My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (DefJam) [wpaudio url="http://www.islanddefjam.com/artist/discography_single.aspx?artistID=7307&productID=12417" text="Kanye West - 'Runaway'" dl="0"] The most controversial and real public figure almost caused a fist fight between Joshua and I at this year’s Thanksgiving. While Josh contended, correctly so, that Kanye’s public persona ruins his art, I contended, also correctly, that it heightens his palette and that the persona is in and of itself a fine work of art. We worked it out, but I was prepared to never speak to one of my best friends again for the cause. 2. Jerry Lewis [...]
Review & Photos: Tea with Joanna Newsom at the Fox Theater, 8/2/10
This week someone asked me to name the best show I had ever seen. What kind of question is that? It's like asking someone what your favorite song is? Impossible! Too many variables: venue, sound, who you are with, number of drinks ingested . . . oh, and the band, don't forget the band. In early 2005, Brightblack Morning Light organized a very cool festival in Bolinas. They called it Quiet Quiet Window Lights and it included Peggy Honeywell, Women and Children, Michael Hurley and Devandra Banhart at Smiley's Saloon plus Vetiver, Brightblack and Joanna Newsom at the Bolinas Community [...]