The Arts Theatre is an unpromising venue for someone anticipating Keren Ann’s sultry, smoky, after-hours vibe. Yes, it’s tiny, but something about the low ceiling, the creaky seating, the unimaginative lighting means it lacks intimacy.
Still, once Keren Ann starts into “Nolita” everything changes. Her voice is a thundering whisper. The music – bass, trumpet and drums – is spare and, yes, haunting. The trumpeter, wearing mirrored shades in the darkness, dances back and forth lke an extra from the Muppet Show as the runs his output through a wah-wah pedal.. His behaviour is jarring, but just goes to highlight the otherworldliness of that voice.
It takes a couple of songs for the atmosphere to warm up. The audience is polite, and Keren Ann seems reticent. But soon shes cracks a joke about her accent going “all Madonna” since she’s been in London., and things loosen up. The band start gossiping about each other behind each other’s backs – “…he thinks he’s the Jimi Hendrix of the trumpet…”. She runs through most of the Nolita and Keren Ann albums. They play around with arrangements, swap instruments, and generally have fun while playing some of the eeriest, sexiest jazz-blues-folk you’ll hear all year.
Why isn’t she more famous? Her relative obscurity is a good thing for the audience tonight, who get to see her close up in a crowd of 350. But she should be bigger. She should be huge. Her songs are pop. They are accessible. Maybe it’s because she (occasionally) sings in French. Perhaps the great British public can never take such a person into their hearts. She reminds me a little of KT Tunstall, in her inventiveness and willingness to play around with genres. Tunstall has made it, and made it big, through a combination of killer tunes, the sheer force of her personailty and an amaxing work ethic.
Maybe Keren Ann is just lazy?
The band do an encore which includes a lively version of Big Yellow Taxi, and something which has some beautiful three way harmonies. Then she sneaks back onstage for another one, requests that all the lights are turned off – that’s right, ALL the lights – then gives what I’d describe as a dark, breathy nursery rhyme. Apparently it’s “Manha de Carnaval”, a French classic.
She’ll be famous. One day. Watch this space.