It is truly special to see an artist mature before your eyes. When I first saw Angel Olsen live in 2014 at the Larimer Lounge, you knew that she would be a special talent; her voice and guitar playing, along with her ambition and personality, all too big for such a small venue, an artistic vision waiting to be fully realized and shared with a much larger audience.
On Sunday night, nearly five years later, Olsen delivered on that promise; her vocals, still haunting and stunning; her stage show, much more ambitious. Olsen, now backed by a larger band with accompanying strings commanded the room throughout the night. It was apparent that her current band is much more confident than that same band in 2014, moving between filling the room with their sounds and dropping down to silence.
Olsen delivered a powerful set, comprised mostly of songs from her latest album “All Mirrors”, along with some of her older hits, like “Shut Up Kiss Me”. The band was in a great mood, celebrating the last night of the first leg of the tour, following a minor setback of a broken-down bus. Olsen joked between songs, bantering with her band and the audience, teasing us with bits of her favorite songs from her youth, like 311’s “Amber”; it was apparent that she was happy to perform for the sold-out crowd at the Gothic Theatre, her last show of this decade.
Olsen’s “All Mirrors” tour is not to be missed. The standouts of the set were her most recent songs like “All Mirrors” and “Lark”, both poignant and evocative with their mix of vocals, keyboard, and strings. While this was the end of the first leg of the tour, Olsen and Co. will hit the road again in 2020, with a string of dates planned for April 2020.
Review and 📸- Manuel Aragon
The setlist for the evening:
New Love Cassette
All Mirrors
Spring
Impasse
Lark
Summer
Tonight
Special
Sweet Dreams
Shut Up Kiss Me
Sister
Endgame
Sans
Encore:
Chance
True Blue
