The concert

Okay, I’ve finally gotten a chance to sit still for a second and talk about the concert we went to on Monday. Starting from the top:
Charlotte Martin: if you’ve ever thought it would be kind of cool to be a Tori Amos fan but ultimately couldn’t handle the stress, allow me to present Charlotte Martin who gives you great piano and voice without the vaguely off-putting “I see deep people” vibe. Call it Amos-style music from someone with whom it’d be a lot more fun to hang out over margaritas.
Her voice fantastic, versatile, clear, and brilliant (for lack of better and more gushing adjectives). Her piano playing is also amazing – alternatively forceful and dark (most impressive) or ethereal and light.
And… the rest of the band? Hardly. Just voice and piano — there are worse things. In retrospect, I would happily plunk down the concert ticket cost just to see her perform a full set. I recommend buying the album if any of the above raving sounds interesting, because you’ll probably enjoy it, but I even more heartily advise listening to her live, if you have the means. In fact, my only complaint with the studio album (recently released from RCA) is that it’s is very… well, it’s very clean (no between-track chit-chat that might have helped capture the singer’s personality). Simply, it lacks some of the fun and fire of the live performance.
Especially the fun: Martin interrupts her own songs to chat with the audience and is generally open, amusing, smart, self-deprecating, and witty, and that doesn’t capture the kind of life she brings to the songs themselves; you leave afterwards really liking this girl — yes, wishing her success and all of that smaltzy stuff, but most importantly checking the next time she’ll be in town (she’s visited Denver three times in the last four months and will be back ‘soonish’ as part of the “Vaginas Vote” tour).