wankerness
Well-Known Member
I just saw Becca in Ohio last week, and I didn't put two and two together either! Oops. My girlfriend is a huge Tigran fan, but stayed home from the Becca show. Had she known...
She missed out, since Becca Stevens is awesome! I'm glad to hear someone else knows who she is and went to her show. The one in Milwaukee was rather poorly attended, though it was in a hole-in-the-wall size venue (I think it was technically full, but there were like 25-30 people there!). From talking to some of the other attendees, it seemed like I was the only one who'd come in from out of town to see her. The only chairs in the room with the stage were literally next to the stage, I was probably 6 feet from Becca and 3 from the drum set. It was kind of awkward (I feel weird looking at a singer if I'm RIGHT IN FRONT OF THEM and they can see me clearly!), but pretty awesome. I'd only heard her albums previously and it was pretty stunning to see that stuff played live, I hadn't noticed how intricate all her guitar playing is. She even managed to make interesting and complex ukelele lines!
She's pretty much a beast, one of the best singers I've ever heard (a great demo is "The Confession" from the Billy Childs Laura Nyro tribute album) and I was pretty shocked at how good her guitar playing was when I saw her live, and she was essentially flawless on both vocal and guitar counts while playing. Also, she had a great sense of humor, I loved all the back and forths with her and the accordion player. They played 14 songs and almost all of them were great, my favorites were the two new songs which she hasn't recorded yet (Heron Hawk and something that David Crosby had written the lyrics for?). Meeting my previously anonymous bass-playing hero afterwards was just the icing on the cake!
Becca Stevens samples, all but the last Laura Nyro - Confession one feature Mr. Tigran bassist on them. She's also the singer for a jazz group that does exclusively Bjork covers, so if you're a bjork fan might want to check those out (Travis Sullivan's Bjorkestra is the name).
(This is an Usher cover, but she made it creepy and the outro sure is badass)
(this live version is a bit more restrained than the album)