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Camera Obscura Setlist
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The Fillmore
San Francisco
June 10, 2024
Camera Obscura have a song for every mood, but my favorite of theirs is anything that conjures Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound—lots of horns and strings, tons of Top 40 refrains, and enough ‘60s girl-group harmonies to fill a mansion where, in my dreams, the Ronettes, the Shangri-las, the Supremes, and the Shirelles all live in multi-part harmony for the rest of my blessed life. We’d eat pancakes every morning, have picnics in the flower-filled garden every afternoon, and sit around the record player in our capri pants and bouffants every evening.
I would have even settled for that brief pop paradise of Belle and Sebastian’s Boaty Weekender cruise back in 2019, playing shuffleboard and touring the Italian seaside towns while listening to all those Glasgow indie pop bands I love. On a big boat! I still kick myself for not going.
Alas. I’ll take what I can get, so I found myself at the famed Fillmore in San Francisco for a brief pop respite on the first night of the work week. I hadn’t seen the band since before keyboardist Carey Lander’s tragic death from cancer in 2015, but I’d caught the band for every stateside tour since the late ‘90s.
I could sense Lander’s absence that evening. Glasgow singer Louis Abbott of the band Admiral Fallow filled in for scheduled opener Photo Ops, who was out sick. He played a lovely, quiet set of melancholy pop songs with just a guitar and his lilting Scottish brogue, before accompanying the headliner. Overall, the night was a subdued affair, with less of the tuneful racket and dance party vibes of fellow Scots Belle and Sebastian, who I’d seen just a month ago.
Despite the low-key vibe, the need to sing along that always infects Camera Obscura fans still circulated. As we waited for them to take the stage, I overheard a young woman near the front, softly singing the band’s perfect pop single, “Hey Lloyd, I’m Ready to Be Heartbroken.” I was singing this on my walk over from the bus stop as I braced myself against the start of a chilly San Francisco summer. “I love that song,” I told her. “We all do,” she said, smiling. Our hearts were all happily primed to break open.
Rather than the dance party I was ready for, we had an evening of dance-light renditions spanning their albums: “French Navy,” “Razzle Dazzle Rose,” “Let’s Get Out of This Country,” “Desire Lines,” and “Teenager,” along with songs from their new album, Look to the East, Look to the West, released in January. These are more thoughtful indie pop songs, tinged with melancholy.
Some of the diehard fans were able to dance a bit to favorites like “Honey in the Sun,” which I sang along out loud, feeling “as warm as saxophones.” But there weren’t enough horns and melodies loud enough to drown out my off-key singalong—a woman in front of me turned around with a glance that looked mildly murderous. I decided to mouth along to the songs instead.
I would’ve loved to have heard “San Francisco Song,” a sweet little organ-based pop ditty from a 2004 Merge Records compilation that I’m quite fond of, as you could easily bop around to it live or in your bedroom (I’ve tested this many times). But the band seemed more subdued for this show, less about the Wall of Sound and more about tender pop moments.
No matter. It was even colder outside, but now my heart was warmer than before. Singing silently on the 24 bus home as I listened to the band on my earphones, coming down from my indie pop high, a stranger across from me smiled. “Are you singing along to something?” he asked. I smiled, taking an earphone out just long enough to say, “Yes. It's a really good song.”
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