Regina Spektor at the House of Blues

Forgot to post this review when I wrote it... Here it is...


Regina Spektor
At the House of Blues, Sept. 22

Standing in line before the show, you would not have guessed you were at a concert with fervent Regina Spektor fans. The mostly 20-something college crowd was content conversing, texting, even doing their homework. But once they were inside the House of Blues entrance, and had enjoyed the decent opening act Little Joy and what seemed like an interminable equipment setup, the crowd got what they came for.
From the moment Regina strode on stage, love was in the air.
As she sat down to her piano for the first tune, “The Calculation,” off her new album “Far,” whooping and hollering and multiple calls of “I love you” filled the hall. Regina genuinely smiled, and almost embarrassingly responded “I love you, too.”
Sitting behind a grand piano and backed by a drummer, a violinist and a cellist, she performed most of her new album, including “Folding Chair,” “Dance Anthem of the ’80s,’’ and “Two Birds.”
“Far” was only released in late June, yet the audience seemed to know every word of every song and sang along in mostly hushed tones so as not to drown out the main attraction. It actually made for an interesting effect since they seemed to know every nuanced turn of the sometimes complicated vocal acrobatics. And luckily for them, Regina didn’t stray too far from the originals.
Among the highlights was an amped-up version of “Eet,” on which she played on electric organ, and “Fidelity” and “On the Radio” from her “Begin to Hope” album. She also played a short set of solo tunes from “Soviet Kitsch” on her fabulous green Gretsch guitar.
At one point, sound from her piano was giving her trouble so she spontaneously performed a song about eye color done a cappella.
Her encore was a thing of beauty. After playing “Samson” and “Fidelity,” she brought out a shofar to help ring in the Jewish new year. And she ended the night with what she called her first-ever, unrecorded country song “Love, You’re a Whore,” which brought the crowd to a roar.
Too bad the audience didn’t know the words. They would have loved to sing along.