Low - Paramount Theatre (Boston, MA; Apr. 29, 2011)

After softly repeating, “I’m nothing but heart,” a dozen times, Alan Sparhawk spit out the lyric again, forcing the “n” from his mouth as though it disgusted him. Each following recitation offered a different tone: bitter, loving, desperate, resigned. Sparhawk’s vocals have a matchless depth in tone, a quality that makes Low stand out as a unique and lasting voice in indie rock. Though you can appreciate this when recorded, Sparhawk’s live vocals are an incomparable, emotional musical offering.

When “Nothing But Heart” reached its heavy, layered climax, Sparhawk gave a final, quiet refrain, and the audience could breathe again. And as they burst into applause, Sparhawk spoke for the first time that night—thirteen songs into a rich set list—thanking the crowd for coming.

Low’s live performance mirrors their songwriting, namely that starkness invites contemplation. The four players, dressed in black, stood on the uncluttered Paramount stage against a plain screen that occasionally changed from one color to another. They played all but one song from their latest release C’mon (Sub Pop Records), with the other half of their set pulling from their lengthy discography. Between songs, after applause, the audience and performers fell completely silent.

During Low’s performance, my contemplation focused on the lyrics that precede that refrain in “Nothing But Heart”: I would be your king / But you want to be free / Confusion and art. To me, Low’s most compelling songs wrestle with spiritual ideas, mixing a range of emotions and voices. “Nothing But Heart” does this beautifully. The opening lines clearly come from a higher power. But who sings, “I’m nothing but heart?” It could be the one offering love, but it could also be the one rejecting it. When the line is repeated over and over again, the listener can interpret it in numerous ways.

This idea of confusing voices likewise struck me during “$20.” And again, it was Sparhawk’s delivery that provoked it. Who sings, “My love is for free?” God? Man? Is the voice that says, “you knew every word” the same as the one that says, “The price is too much, but it’s nothing to us?” When Sparhawk repeated the refrain, “My love is for free,” it felt at once loving and bitter. Like in “Nothing But Heart,” it was both the one who offered love and the one who rejected it.

Last time Low came to Boston, I summarized the tone of Low’s music this way:

Low’s songs contemplate the ordinary and the sublime with somber reserve; yet at the same time, they harbor latent, volatile emotion. Though you may get lost in the music, you’re never put at ease.

After Friday’s show, my insight is that it’s not “latent, volatile emotion” that’s unsettling in Low’s music. It’s more like the presence of multiple, competing voices. When Sparhawk sings a line that’s at once loving and bitter (and there’s always that bitter touch, as he cuts his consonants so harshly and slowly), he may be singing from more than one perspective. And perhaps why Mimi Parker’s vocals perfectly complement Sparhawk’s, is because she offers a contrasting, soothing voice of peace and grace. 

Of course, I may be over-thinking Low’s music, and I should save this kind of rambling for a post-show discussion at the pub (or over some decaf coffee—wink, wink, Mormon fans). If you made it through the last three paragraphs, I’m grateful. But this is what I love about Low. Their slow, simple compositions and poetic lyrics invite a range of interpretation. Surely I’m projecting my own spiritual wrestling onto this music, and I suspect I’m not the only Low fan who does this.

So to get us off of this rabbit trail, I’ll leave you with my two favorite audience moments, which were, in fact, the only two times I heard a noise from the seats before the encore. The first was when a man in front chuckled after the concluding line of “Something’s Turning Over”: And just because you never hear their voices / Don’t mean they won’t kill you in your sleep. Every time I hear this line, I crack up, too. There’s certainly nothing funny about this song. It’s a dark contemplation of the “things we turn our back on” causing our ultimate demise. But that ending is so dramatic and unexpected, that it makes at least two Low fans laugh. [Speaking of Low’s humor, if someone wants to explain their anger towards “guys who try to act like Al Green,” I’m all ears. I’m hoping it’s a Mayer Hawthorne diss.]

The second moment came after the performers returned to the stage for an encore. After sitting through the always intense “Murderer” and thunderous, sustained pause, the audience quickly turned silent again, and someone let out a (perhaps intentionally) loud sigh. Likewise, it was the first moment of the night I felt the tension from my shoulders release and I could finally breathe normally. Damn, these Low shows are intense.

Setlist:

01. Point of Disgust - Trust
02. Breaker - Drums and Guns
03. You See Everything - C’mon
04. Try to Sleep - C’mon
05. Monkey - The Great Destroyer
06. Silver Rider - The Great Destroyer
07. Especially Me - C’mon
08. Witches - C’mon
09. $20 - C’mon
10. Magesty/Magic - C’mon
11. Nightingale - C’mon
12. Last Snowstorm of the Year - Trust
13. Nothing But Heart - C’mon
14. Something’s Turning Over - C’mon
15. Murderer - Drums and Guns

Encore:

01. Sunflower - Things We Lost in the Fire
02. Canada - Trust
03. Violent Past – Drugs and Guns
04. Shame – Long Division
05. When I Go Deaf - The Great Destroyer

DOWNLOAD: Low - Especially Me (MP3) or Follow us for more Low MP3s (Twitter)

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