Imogen Heap - Chicago, IL

Imogen Heap deserves some old world poesy, I decided, and some thought about romance and magic. I thought about nymphs and fairies and shiny sheer wings, of naughty, sexy sprites, of Bugs Bunny dressed as a girl and of dewy wishes come true in the sultry summer moonlight. Then I thought that all of those images and ideas are banal and crap and do not do her complicated persona justice anyway. Probably the most apt comparison to make would be to a season; she is the embodiment of an entire season, which I reckon is a banal and crappy metaphor in itself but it is, at the very least, on a pretty grand scale. So then it's like, "Okay, which season? Which one is she?" Here's which: Imogen is all four seasons dynamically fused. She possesses the howling defiance of winter, the gnashing irreverence of summer, the humorous optimism of spring, and she won't let you forget for a second that she is also cryptic Halloween.

The atmosphere at the comparatively swank Park West was mellow, sedate, cultured, and intelligent. There was a lot of spread age-wise; mid-late twenties to sixties, easily. Judging by clothes, hair, and spray-on tans, it appeared to be an affluent crowd as well. It was standing room only on the floor and up on the balconies; the only gaps were in the VIP section, interspersed with tubby business types. Okay; a really atypical percentage of beautiful women were present; women who take care of themselves - see aforementioned hair, clothes, and spray-on tan reference. The opener, American Zoe Keating, came out and sat before her cello looking clownish in a big crazy hairdo and whimsical red sneakers. She informed us that she'd be playing a song she'd written for the 60th anniversary of the Trinity test-nuclear explosion, one she'd composed to ensure the crowd didn't lose site of the gravity of the event. "It's my job to add seriousness," she said, and began to play a very strong and melancholy tune with a lot of buildup, crescendos in a minor key. She'd recorded herself onstage, then played the recorded section back and played live over that, then added more layers of recorded, looped sound, creating a sort of a "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" effect on the cello. "Don't Worry," the 3rd song, started with a sweet, light, and atmospheric pre-recorded pizzicato. That was refreshing, but overall I found the many layers of cello harmony became irritating. In the end it was a bit too much of the same sound.

The set was concurrently playful and slick. Big, white, circular fans hung above the stage; Asian in style and of varying heights and angles, they evolved into globes of varying bright greens, blues, and pinks throughout the show, accompanying an attractive light display consisting simply of a large white cloth supporting a sheet of tiny colored lights providing the backdrop. Imogen came out in a large flowered skirt and a black corset which she immediately complained about, then called addictive. "You just fall in love with the shape." She was bouncy, comfortable, full of good humor, and very, very girly. Right away she multi-tracked and sang, clapped, and snapped with herself on "Just for Now," from the new album Speak for Yourself. Next she introduced her "band"; the MIDI keyboard serving as bass, a beat box, her four-track sampler/harmony machine, the Mac laptop playing the man behind the velvet curtain, and a few other technical dealies I'd be faking it to try and list accurately. It was a confusing-looking undertaking, but she held a pose of relaxed mastery over the whole operation that put us all in the mood.

Her second song, "Say Goodnight and Go" reminded me that her vocals have some aesthetic qualities shared by Sarah McLachlan, Tori Amos, a little Sade, and a bit of Coccteau Twins' Elizabeth Fraser. She stepped up to that black baby grand for the third song, "Come Here Boy" a cut off her first solo album, and commented on how nice it was to play a real piano for a change. She took full advantage and showed us a soft, ghostly ache that I still reflect on today. Not one to be pigeonholed, she then reminded us of her goofy charm with a tale about her first gig in Chicago, one nobody showed up at because it landed on the same night as the last episode of "Seinfeld." Next came the intricate "The Walk" off the new record and then "Loose Ends," which was a little more forceful, masculine, strong and pounding. We were treated to some great emotive, primal screaming and a wonderfully abrupt stop.

Zoe returned to play cello along with "Speeding Cars," slow and sweet and penetrating; a drama of intensity and emotion from quiet to feeling, breathing thunder. Then, the soft vocals on "Clear the Area" couldn't muffle her message of unconditional support: "You'll find your way back down, and I'll keep the area clear." She saddled back up to the piano and dipped into her Frou Frou days with "Let Go" which gorgeously, painfully expresses that "there's beauty in the breakdown." For her first encore she was back to the piano for the poplular "Candlelight" from I, Megaphone. Then she went into one that made some big rock noise, danced and flailed around; all dramatic black and white geisha wailing, it was by far the most my style up to this point. "It took the breath out of me, that one!" she said, and joked about the corset again. She missed a note on the piano starting the final song, "The Moment I Said It," immediately blamed and chastised the piano, then started again. The humor with which it began shredded away to empathetic apprehension when the gist of the song hit home: "I've got a bad feeling about this, trust me on this one; you're going to throw it all away."

Recording what you play and instantly looping and integrating it into a song gives one the part-of-the-action, up close feel of, say, watching your food be masterfully prepared for you right at your table at a Japanese steakhouse. In fact, at one point Imogen said that the cheers from the very audience there that night made it into the song at hand. As I mentioned earlier, with just the cello in Zoe's opener it was a bit much of one thing, the innovation of the layers of sound grew tired quickly. But with vocals, beats, and keyboards all at hand the landscape spreads out endlessly.

Imogen is cute, like a girl playing dress-up cute. She reminds me of the Pride parade. She's intelligent, funny, and endearingly self-deprecating, but she also exudes a whisper of discerning taste, not quite elitism but of familiarity with the upper echelon; perhaps a clinging wisp leftover from her boarding school days when she trained in classical piano. Eh, maybe it's just the accent. She's very, very creative, energetic, and talented. I now align myself with the crowd of Heap fanatics, having so enjoyed this live show. I am, officially, a fan for all seasons.