The buzz around indie-folk musician Angel Olsen has been burgeoning over the past couple of years, and on Sunday night, local fans finally got their chance to experience her distinctive songcraft in person as she played her first local show in front of a raptly attentive audience at DC9.
A product of Chicago’s ever-fertile music scene, the 26-year-old first gained notoriety for her collaborations with Will Oldham (a.k.a. Bonnie “Prince” Billy) before breaking out as a solo artist with her first LP, 2012’s Half Way Home. Now working with a two-piece backing band featuring Stewart Bronaugh on bass and Josh Jaeger on drums, Olsen delivered a brief but highly satisfying performance that lived up to the considerable hype.
It’s not easy to stand out within the always well-populated ranks of guitar-strumming singer-songwriters, but Olsen manages to do so on the strength of a captivating voice that possesses impressive dynamic range and a raw, untutored expressiveness that often runs askew of traditional techniques, phrasings, and melodic structures. On the set-opening “Acrobat,” she eased in with an inviting, sensuous lilt (“I love the way your body’s made / I love the way your voice is sex”) before abruptly unleashing a haunting, yodel-like refrain (“I am life / I thought that I’d died”). Two songs later, “Always Half Strange” likewise began with Olsen’s vocals at a simmer, her singing escalating in pitch and intensity until she cut loose into a plaintive yelp during the climactic mantra (“Always love / like no other love I’d known before”).
Olsen also showed aplomb as a guitarist, nimbly plucking arpeggios on her Fender Stratocaster, which she frequently retuned between songs, charmingly filling the long pauses with shy, awkward banter. Her upbeat, guileless stage persona contrasted with the melancholic, yearning tone of her lyrics, which dealt with elemental, time-honored themes (“there’s no harm, it’s what we need,” she argued during “Free”).
Bolstered by solidly understated accompaniment from the rhythm section, songs like “Tiniest Seed” gained heft and punch compared with Olsen’s oft-minimalist recordings, and the setlist had an engaging, well-paced flow. “Sweet Dreams,” a selection from Olsen’s 2013 7-inch Sleepwalker, provided a mid-set highlight and hinted at new directions her songwriting might take in collaboration with her new band. Propelled by driving chords and a retro-tinged garage-rock cadence, it was the loudest, most up-tempo song of the night, punctuated by wailing choruses from Olsen that evoked the stylings of Roy Orbison, Chris Isaak, and Sharon Van Etten.
Displaying confidence in the depth of her expanding repertoire, Olsen left arguably her best song on the table, opting not to play Half Way Home‘s standout track “The Waiting.” She also left without a proper encore, ending her set somewhat unceremoniously after playing a one-song coda without her backing band. “There’s karaoke later,” she offered, referring to the amateur shenanigans occurring on DC9’s roof deck, but most in the audience were probably looking forward much more to her next appearance in the District.
