The Most Beautiful Woman in the World
What: Cat Power live in Lisbon
Where: Aula Magna
When: 04/12/2006
Just a brief review of Cat Power’s concert, last night in Lisbon while ideas are still fresh…
The concert was held at a small auditorium at the University of Lisbon. It was an intimate atmosphere with a dedicated audience anxious to see how the temperamental singer would do after having played a set which ended abruptly when she stormed off stage a couple of years ago.
The entire concert focused predominantly on songs from The Greatest. I didn’t know what to expect really, having heard so many stories about how temperamental she is, missing concerts, fighting with audiences, being dubbed as “crazy” and “irrational” . Personally I do not identify her with these simple minded characteristics at all. I’m sorry I cannot remember the setlist in its entirety, but as far as her performance is concerned I found her to be someone who does not play according to normal standards and deliberately defies the norm. Her on stage anxiety is still there (she abruptly stopped short of almost finishing a song because someone in the audience was coughing, which she said was a sign of boredom…), and she is focused one minute and distraught the next, however her usual self-loathing has disappeared and she seemed genuinely desirous to engage her audience. She strutted around, danced, flirted with all of us and showed greater confidence on stage. Musically the performance was technically flawed but when you are treated to that mesmerizing sandy voice of hers that comes from somewhere deep within, channeling all those blues and soul, that hardly seems to matter. Like a modern day Nina Simone…
We were treated to 5 or 6 covers and as I am not familiar with her Covers Record they just sounded off-record treats to me. I do remember she covered a Tindersticks song I cannot recall and “Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley. The show ended with Cat apologizing once again for her concert fuck-up a couple of years ago and distributing setlists among the audience.
Considering all the positive and negative aspects of this concert one thing is certain: it’s a concert I will never forget.
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