Last week Rachelle and I went to see First Aid Kit perform at the Great Hall on Queen Street. The opening act was a trio from England called Peggy Sue. The lead singer had frizzed-out, slightly hung-over hair and a mildly bored manner about her.
The other guitarist, who resembled a shorter, plumper version of Amy Winehouse, looked like the sarcastic one in high school. Filling out the trio was a bearded hipster, who played the drums in the background.
Pared down, they played the sort of music you’d imagine listening to as you drove across America getting a tattoo in each state. But then, springing from the percussive spine of their sound, the music would take jangled, angry flight, as if tacked on to suggest an emotional and unpredictable complexity beating within. In short order it became predictable and I began to feel old, imagining the lives of the performers in 15 years. Would the lead singer have named her daughter Peggy Sue, and now a schoolteacher, surprise her students by knocking a song out of the park at a Christmas assembly?
First Aid Kit took the stage to the enthusiastic applause of the 500 or so people who were there. The band is comprised of two Swedish sisters, Johanna and Klara Soderberg. They’re young and beautiful.
Johanna, the older of the two, is tall and thin and dresses like a pioneer. Klara, the propulsive force of the band, is broader in stature, sporting candid black banks and introspective, watchful eyes. There’s something spooky sweet about them, and they have gorgeous, mesmerizing voices, so pure as to feel like the girls are antennas that pick up divine currents inaccessible to the rest of us.
They became “stars” four years ago (when they were just 18 and 15) after they posted a song that they covered by Fleet Foxes on YouTube. By far, it’s been the most successful thing that they’ve ever done, proving much more popular than any of the more polished or managed material that’s followed. Unlike this video, which felt incredibly sincere and intimate, the girls seemed like they were playing roles on stage, that they were being handled by people who had told them that they knew what it took to “make it” in the music biz. It was a little bit demoralizing, actually.
Seeming still so young and optimistic, the show sometimes had the feel of attending a Christian campfire sing-a-long. They just didn’t own the experience of their songs, and they seemed at their best covering material written by others. Watching, I longed for them to return to their unselfconscious states when they were at their most beautiful best– as perhaps we all were– before we knew who we were to become and before people started telling us how best to get there. I wanted to return to the past and stumble upon their video afresh—delighting in the potential of two unexpected and radiant girls, mysterious wonders of nature, singing as if for their pleasure alone.
Comments
6 responses to “Seeing First Aid Kit in Toronto”
Oh, J. Michael Murray! Do you not understand that the band, Peggy Sue, is quite the thing among bloggers? The track “Cut My Teeth” is quite popular. The air of disaffected, disinterest in anything at all is part of their oeuvre! I suppose it could be quite off-putting when seeing them onstage but as far as the studio output goes. it is quite effective. I’m not defending them… or maybe I am. I find the band to be more engaging than First Aid Kit. They are lovely girls but there are 100 singer/songwriters in Tulsa, Oklahoma with more talent. Given their youth, I’ll cut some slack but, honestly, give Peggy Sue a chance.
I’m about to send some Fiawna Forte’ music your way.
Doc:
I think I’m actually entirely with you on this. I preferred Peggy Sue to First Aid Kit, too, there was some grit to them, a feeling that they had to work toward the grace that feel so innocently and easily to the Soderbeg girls. Their music was certainly more interesting and varied, and I would very much like to hear more.
Oh, dear. My comment came off as rather harsh, which was not at all what I had intended. Thank you for the kind reply and please accept my apology, sir.
Doc:
You weren’t in the least harsh and have not a thing to apologize for. In fact, I thank you for retuning me to Peggy Sue and for now turning me on to Fiawna Forte!
I grew up singing songs with Christians around camp fires.
In 1980 I was attending bible college on the outskirts of Toronto. In the spring a group of us, young, sure of our faith, headed out to the island. On our way back on the ferry (I love ferries) the sun was setting low behind the city. A brilliant orange ball of cosmic glory shining in front of us. We broke out into a rousing chorus of ‘Our God Reigns’ on the forward deck of the ferry.
I never felt so awkward in my life.
Would Christians sing “Hard Believer” by the campfire? A song the Soderberg sisters wrote after reading Richard Dawkins and wanting to tell a friend that his Bible was “delusion imagery”?
Anyhow, I don’t really get that bit about them being “handled” by people telling them what to do and how to make it.
They’d already been signed and even released their first EP before they posted that Fleet Foxes cover on YouTube.
That EP, and their 2010 album, which made up about half of the Toronto set, were completely written and performed by the sisters (except for the drums), and the only real help they had was by their father – an old punk rock bassist – who served as producer.
They didn’t really get any outside assistance at all before they headed to Omaha to record their latest album with producer Mike Mogis of Bright Eyes.
By that time, they had already toured Europe, North America and Australia.
You didn’t like what you saw (and heard), and that’s perfectly fine, but no need to find it “demoralizing”.
Those girls are fully in charge of their own careers.
They may not have evolved to your liking, but hey, you’ll always have YouTube. 😉