NYC shows

[soulfadelic]

I'm so happy I got to see The River live. But T5 just wasn't that great in terms of sound quality. By the end of the show the engineer must have gotten the mix right, but it was still kind of muddy. The new material is best suited to small intimate spaces... how awesome would it have been if she rented out Judson Memorial Church or some similar space for 3-4 nights?

[DrDark]

PJ was great tonight for her 2nd NY show. She played "The River" mid set, which was a surprise. A greater surprise was that she didn't play "Down by the Water". Was this a first?

Almost. They've played DBTW every time on the tour until tonight except for the 1st (secret) gig back in December. Good to see they're mixing up the setlist a bit. I'll take The River over DBTW every time.

[olivier101]

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2011/04/pj_harvey_playe.html

Amusing reader comments at the end.

Not sure which one you were referring to, but judging from the comments, it seems the world is now more than ever divided into PJ lovers and PJ haters...

[DrDark]

2nd show review:
http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2 ... aye_1.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[DrDark]

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/ ... w-20110421" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[soulfadelic]

I was browsing Twitter and one guy called the show "dour" and said "this is what it must have been like to see Dylan in the 70s." I don't agree, but I get where he's coming from, thinking she's a bit lost in the wilderness... I really like 70s Dylan.

[revenire]

PJ Harvey At Terminal 5
http://www.nypress.com/blog-8764-pj-har ... nal-5.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Tribal priestess, P.J. Harvey, took the stage at Terminal 5 on Wednesday. As an artist with continual incarnations, this one as a chieftess is replete with black feathered headdress harkening to native American ceremonial plumage and a white flowing dress, made for a goddess of song that defies time or place, yet who uncannily plays with both.

Her music on Wednesday, a presentation of her new collection of work on an album released in the U.S. in February, Let England Shake, is as much a mysterious confluence of styles as her costume (tribal beats, modern rock, Celtic folk-like vocals, to name a few). For this eighth album, she returns to a tribal, primitive aesthetic, with pounding, solemn and playful rhythms interlaced with repeating words that feel like a chant to an earth goddess.

The songs soar and spiral, but unlike the release offered to the audience in her earlier work, such as the iconic “Rid of Me” which spilled outward into a frenzy of intense emotion, and garnered her a loyal following, these songs build and build and then stop before any spillage happens. The primitive intensity, which may have been missing for some of her later albums, returns in this collection, but it is more controlled, and directed—as if stored up as a chant or a mantra, it may have powers of rejuvenation over the forces of anguish and devastation. Still, Harvey is devastating, and the sold out audience could feel the electric current in the air. This is Harvey at her goddess best.

The album is openly about war and its consequences and the role of nationhood in the making of the mess. Each song evokes images of war, oil fields burning in the Middle East (“Written on the Forehead”), a soldier dying (“The Colour of the Earth” sung with Mick Harvey) or the damage of the war on its participants such as in the lyric “I’ve seen and done things I want to forget,” (“Words that Maketh Murder). Trumpet fragments of English battle hymns in a couple of songs critically evoke the longing and sadness of belonging to a nation with all its contradictions, adding a specifically English touch to the trans-local theme.

Let England Shake was recorded in a 19th Century church in Dorset, on a cliff-top overlooking the sea. Perhaps it’s the sea and the church that are leaving their imprint on this album, with primordial energy, emotion and wisdom speaking to our higher selves, through a musical language all her very own.

[DrDark]

http://www.thelmagazine.com/TheMeasure/ ... terminal-5" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Pitifuljoy]

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2011/04/pj_harvey_playe.html

Amusing reader comments at the end.

The article writer clearly did her research. "Let It Shake" huh? Even with the pic of the merch and the set list at the bottom!

[DrDark]

http://www.thevine.com.au/music/live-re ... 10427.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;