In-store: Fanshaw

Fanshaw

Criminal Records. Friday, June 18, 2010.

In-store performances at Criminal Records seem to go to extremes of attendance: the ones I've been to have either been tightly packed or rather thinly attended.¹ This early evening with Fanshaw — an early-evening solo spot before a full NXNE set with her backing group later that night — was one of the latter. Olivia Fetherstonhaugh, who formed the band to deliver her voice and words, was alone on the stage at the back of the store, her snazzy red Jaguar plugged right into the board, playing her songs to a crowd in the single digits. Though sporting a lovely voice and some well-crafted songs that had gained Dark Eyes, her debut album, a release from Mint Records², Fetherstonhaugh was still a bit tentative and self-deprecating on stage, leading off by commenting, "I'm going to play an easy one first — I guess they're all easy."

The songs might be melodically straightforward, but Fetherstonhaugh had some well-hewn lyrics, including a penchant for daydreamy observations, such as on "O Sailor". And even moreso on lucid dream-ramble "Paperboy", which did a nice job of sliding in and out of different realities. I was enjoying it all, but that one sold me on the whole enterprise. The set, six quick songs, ended with one non-album selection — a precursor to "Strong Hips" that was raw and quite directly introspective, examining her self-doubts — "I'm not even a real musician / Well, I play guitar, but it's my drummer who tunes it / Did I drop out for this?" It was emotionally affecting but less sharply-crafted than the newer stuff from her album — a sign of how far she has advanced.

There were only a handful of people listening, but if you believe in the old saw about making fans one-at-a-time, it was a success.³ I left with a copy of her album — and more notably, at the end of the set a trio of teenaged girls came up to talk to her, moved by it despite having come across the performance by chance while they were browsing in the store.

Listen to a track from this set here.

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¹ Either way, the folks at Criminal deserve big praise for hosting these events on a regular basis. Especially during NXNE, when its nice to have extra chances to catch bands in the overloaded crush of stuff going on.

² Fetherstonhaugh is also a member of Vancouver's The Choir Practice, which has also released an album on Mint.

³ You're also welcome, I suppose, to view that as untenably romantic, considering the economic realities involved in having a band come out from Vancouver. Hopefully they made some more fans at their formal NXNE set, too.