I recently discovered this wonderful singer/songwriter named St. Vincent (who takes her name from a Nick Cave lyric), and I can't get enough. She also a talented guitarist, and has a collaboration album with David Byrne. Plus she's real pretty to boot! Is anyone here familiar with her?
I was introduced to St. Vincent by way of My Brightest Diamond, as both Shara and Annie toured with Sufjan Stevens. Her current persona is becoming a bit of a turn off. Uncertain whether it's put on (thanks, David Byrne), or, perhaps she simply is a bit of a dick. Nonetheless, the music remains solid. I'd highly recommend attending a gig if possible; she's fantastic live.
St. Vincent’s Annie Clark often draws comparisons to David Byrne for her quirky on-stage persona, but during yesterday’s performance at Austin City Limits, the purple-haired singer-songwriter gave her best impression of Eddie Vedder. When not wreaking total havoc with her guitar, Clark swung from stage scaffolding and dove into the audience to take people’s clothing, even ending up with someone’s crutch.
Moderate fan. Have known about her for last 5-6 years or so and have her first 2-3 releases. I haven't kept up with her to the extent that i know the rhyme or reason of her current stage persona & antics, but it's probably the usual, "I'm trying new things, pushing boundaries", etc., mindset.
The new album's decent, pretty good pop music with some sharp fangs, but IMO it's her weakest since the debut (excluding the Byrne collab).
My favourites are Actor and Strange Mercy. The self-titled 2014 one was also very good, but her post-Byrne / cult leader / Android persona and increasingly choreographed shows have been a bit off-putting. I guess putting on this 'performer mask' is a defense mechanism for some musicians but I wish she didn't come across so... detached.
"This song is named after the co-founder of the Black Panthers. Huey Newton appeared to St. Vincent's Annie Clark in a dream after she took a sedative to relieve jet lag while on tour in Helsinki. "If you take one and go to sleep, you sleep for 12 hours," she told The Observer. "If you take one and don't fall asleep, you're high. It's bananas. You're in that high state between sleepfulness and wakefulness. I had this hallucination that Huey Newton was in the room with me. We didn't talk about the Black Panther party. We just kind of communicated. We understood each other. I was as high as a kite."
The lyrics are a series of free association bleak images designed to feel like a Google wormhole. Clark told Uncut magazine: "I wrote the words for in a very furious frenzy, it was just free association. I was trying to be meta with it, and every line is tied to the next in a way that I don't even understand. I did a lot of that. It has the feel of an extended Google search, and is set in the near future, after a long winter."
The song later refers to The Heaven's Gate cult. Heaven's Gate is one of Clark's obsessions, which she told NME. "I am fascinated by and love, if you can say that you love a cult where they were waiting for the comet to come and committed suicide, all wearing Nikes."
BTW, that's Matt Johnson drumming (ex Jeff Buckley drummer).
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