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Photo Gallery
Lights: Electric Fetus in-store Setlist
Lights: Mill City Nights Setlist
Tour Dates
02/18 St. Louis, MO Ready Room^
02/20 Dallas, TX Granada Theater^ 02/21 Austin, TX Emo's^ 02/22 Houston, TX Warehouse Live^ 02/24 Orlando, FL Beacham Theater^ 02/25 Ft. Lauderdale, FL Culture Room^ 02/27 Atlanta, GA The Masquerade^ 02/28 Carrboro, NC Cat's Cradle^ 03/01 Nashville, TN Rocketown^ 03/02 Charlotte, NC The Fillmore Charlotte^ 03/04 Norfolk, VA The NorVa^ 03/05 Pittsburgh, PA Mr. Small's Theatre^ 03/06 Columbus, OH Skully's Music Diner^ 03/07 Indianapolis, IN Deluxe ^ 03/09 Cleveland, OH House of Blues - Cleveland^ 03/10 Grand Rapids, MI The Intersection^ 04/11 Indio, CA Coachella Week 1 04/14 Phoenix, AZ Marquee Theatre* 04/15 San Diego, CA The Irenic* 04/16 Sacramento, CA Ace of Spades* 04/18 Indio, CA Coachella Week 2 04/20 Montreal, QC Bell Centre+ 04/21 Ottawa, ON Canadian Tire Centre+ 04/22 London, ON Budweiser Gardens+ 04/24 Toronto, ON Air Canada Centre+ 04/25 Sudbury, ON Sudbury Arena+ 04/27 Winnipeg, MB MTS Centre+ 04/29 Edmonton, AB Rexall Place+ 04/30 Calgary, AB Scotiabank Saddledome + ^ with X Ambassadors * with Saint Motel + with OneRepublic Read More
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Valentine’s Day in Minneapolis was one of Love and Light… make that Lights.
The buzzworthy Toronto singer-songwriter was in town promoting her latest release, Little Machines (Warner Bros Records) with shows to receptive crowds both during the day, and at night.
The afternoon show was a short acoustic set at local record store, The Electric Fetus, with only the singer (aka Valerie Poxleitner) and her guitarist Brodie Tavares playing stripped down versions of her usually electronic-heavy pop songs. This gave the very full crowd a chance to hear the new songs in a completely different light; that drew more attention on the lyrical content and better showcased the range of Lights’ vocals.
The set began with a song never performed acoustically before, ‘Same Sea’ and was followed by a song about hanging around as a bit of a tomboy playing video games, called ‘Running With the Boys’.
‘Up We Go’ was a positive song she wrote without first believing the lyrics, only to have them lift her up during the creative process, and ended with ‘Muscle Memory’, which sounded completely different, stripped of all the synths of the recorded version.
The evening’s performance at downtown club Mill City Nights, started with an opening 45 min. set from New York alternative four-piece, X Ambassadors, who has had a recent EP out, The Reason (KIDinaKORNER, Interscope Records) and more recent single, ‘Jungle’ feat. Jamie N Commons and Jay-Z.
The band, who has producer connections to, and has opened for Imagine Dragons, has learned the art of audience participation well and had a built-in cheering section, as several members of guitarist Noah Feldshuh’s family were enthusiastically present on the main floor.
Brothers Sam and Casey Harris play well off each other, with keyboardist Casey’s hair flailing throughout the set and singer Sam sets himself as unique by playing keyboard loops, guitar, and alto sax, while vocally reaching falsetto heights several times.
Lights took to the stage for her 70 min. headlining set, dressed in black tank top and pants, with a red majorette jacket and was backed with her band, by a dazzling set of circular lights at the back of the stage. Though aptly gathering of her own attention, previously touring with and having a similar synth pop sound to local artist Owl City, probably endeared her more to the mostly younger crowd and couples in attendance.
The new ‘Muscle Memory’, a mid-tempo’d heavy synth song got things started on the right foot, with ‘Toes’ from 2011’s Siberia, following to roars and whooping “I love you’s” from the young crowd. “This song’s about winter time”, she said, launching into ‘My Boots’ and noting how obviously cold it was outside.
In the spirit of the day of love, Lights and guitarist Tavares took another acoustic turn mid-set for “one of the most honest love songs I’ve ever written”, the haunting ‘Don’t Go Home Without Me’. A playful and quickly aborted ‘Hakuna Matata’ cover led smoothly into the rhythmic anthem, ‘Timing is Everything’ and ‘Same Sea’ (the song she started the afternoon session with), closed the main set.
Two songs from the new album comprised the encore- the poppy ‘Up We Go’ and a “song about science”, ‘Oil and Water’, which started somewhat slow paced for a final song, but gradually built itself into a set-ending crescendo.
As Lights smiled and waved goodbye to the Valentine’s crowd, no doubt her mind was one particular true love, her daughter Rocket Wild (you can’t make these rock star kid names up, folks), who would turn one the next day.
The buzzworthy Toronto singer-songwriter was in town promoting her latest release, Little Machines (Warner Bros Records) with shows to receptive crowds both during the day, and at night.
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Lights at The Electric Fetus
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The set began with a song never performed acoustically before, ‘Same Sea’ and was followed by a song about hanging around as a bit of a tomboy playing video games, called ‘Running With the Boys’.
‘Up We Go’ was a positive song she wrote without first believing the lyrics, only to have them lift her up during the creative process, and ended with ‘Muscle Memory’, which sounded completely different, stripped of all the synths of the recorded version.
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X Ambassadors
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The band, who has producer connections to, and has opened for Imagine Dragons, has learned the art of audience participation well and had a built-in cheering section, as several members of guitarist Noah Feldshuh’s family were enthusiastically present on the main floor.
Brothers Sam and Casey Harris play well off each other, with keyboardist Casey’s hair flailing throughout the set and singer Sam sets himself as unique by playing keyboard loops, guitar, and alto sax, while vocally reaching falsetto heights several times.
Lights took to the stage for her 70 min. headlining set, dressed in black tank top and pants, with a red majorette jacket and was backed with her band, by a dazzling set of circular lights at the back of the stage. Though aptly gathering of her own attention, previously touring with and having a similar synth pop sound to local artist Owl City, probably endeared her more to the mostly younger crowd and couples in attendance.
The new ‘Muscle Memory’, a mid-tempo’d heavy synth song got things started on the right foot, with ‘Toes’ from 2011’s Siberia, following to roars and whooping “I love you’s” from the young crowd. “This song’s about winter time”, she said, launching into ‘My Boots’ and noting how obviously cold it was outside.
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Lights
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Two songs from the new album comprised the encore- the poppy ‘Up We Go’ and a “song about science”, ‘Oil and Water’, which started somewhat slow paced for a final song, but gradually built itself into a set-ending crescendo.
As Lights smiled and waved goodbye to the Valentine’s crowd, no doubt her mind was one particular true love, her daughter Rocket Wild (you can’t make these rock star kid names up, folks), who would turn one the next day.
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Lights at Mill City Nights, Minneapolis (14 Feb 2015) |
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