Read previous – Lucy Dacus @ White Eagle Hall in Jersey City
Lucy Dacus played a 2nd straight sold out night at Union Transfer in Philly on Thursday, October 21st. However, for this one, she brought along buzzworthy artist Bartees Strange to open. Since the release of his excellent 2020 debut LP Live Forever and breakout track “Boomer“, I’ve been highly anticipating catching him live. His genre-bending debut LP is like nothing else in recent memory. Tracks like “Mustang” and “Boomer” are soulful post-punk revival bangers you didn’t know you needed and are contrasted by unconventional R&B/hip hop tracks like “Free Kelly Rowland” and “Flagey God”. The DC-based musician (by way of England and Oklahoma) played a way too short set, but performed a new song titled “17” as well as a cover of The National’s “Lemonworld” (from his early-2020 Say Goodbye to Pretty Boy EP). Bartees closed out his set with “Boomer” and, frankly, I’m disappointed in the Philly crowd for not going full on buck wild. No doubt, the next time he comes to town, it’ll be on his own sold out headlining tour. Bartees Strange is the pandemic-era breakout artist, period.
Before Lucy Dacus took the stage, home videos from her childhood were projected on a screen. These slice of life moments showed a happy-go-lucky kid playing with Barbies and concluded with her performing her very first shows. It was home videos like this that inspired the naming of her latest LP Home Video; however, nothing in these videos indicated any sort of the type of trauma that would later inspire her to write lyrics like “the future is a benevolent black hole” (from “Cartwheel“). Upon its release this past summer, Home Video unjustly didn’t receive the sort of fanfare usually bestowed upon her contemporaries. Musically and lyrically, Home Video is a masterpiece and is my current album of choice when I’m in need of some hyper-specific heartbreaking yearning (which is often). It’s essentially my folklore/evermore of 2021 – if you know me, you’ll understand the gravity of such a statement.
Lucy and band aptly started off their set with “First Time”, which they had to start playing a second time when the instruments cut out during the lyrics “you can’t feel it for the first time, a second time”. Note: it felt even better the second time they played it. Roughly half-way into their set, Lucy proclaimed that she was about to play the best song she ever wrote and then launched into a cover of Springsteen’s “Dancing In The Dark” (which, by Q&A, we learned was her favorite song to perform live) which was then shortly followed by a non-auto-tune rendition of “Partner In Crime” accompanied only by acoustic guitar. And did anyone else know that Lucy moved to Philly? This was another tidbit we learned about her during Q&A before they proceeded to play my straight up jam “Brando”. Illuminated by 2 spotlights, Lucy gave a moving performance of “Thumbs” and then quickly lightened up the mood with a sing-long of “Going Going Gone” (joined by Bartees on stage). She closed out the night with a 2-song encore which included “Triple Dog Dare” and an untitled new song.
From beginning to end, the night was a rollercoaster of emotions. That includes finding out that my car had been blocked in by an inconsiderate ass in a Honda Fit and I had to wait around for half an hour for them to show up and move their car. Well, there goes my beauty sleep. Before finally turning in for the night, my final plea was to not end up being the kind of dad that Lucy sings about on “Thumbs”, then I proceeded to have a nightmare where my eyeballs burst. The end.
Check out the video for “Brando” below and keep scrolling to see more photos from the show.
