Concert recap: St. Vincent gives high-wire excitement

St. Vincent is the brain child of Anne Erin “Annie” Clark. Trying to pigeonhole St. Vincent into a specific genre is a futile effort at best. Annie, for the lack of a better description, is a performance artist who happens to play music — and quite well, at that.

Thursday night (10/9/14) St. Vincent played to a nearly sold-out crowd at the House of Blues. Annie took every opportunity to bring the crowd into her world, whether through interpretive dances, prolonged story-telling episodes, or a tight wire act around the balcony.

St. Vincent is on tour supporting its latest self-titled effort, St. Vincent. The set reflected mostly material from that, as well as Annie’s first three releases.

The encore was by far the highlight of the evening, as Annie returned to the stage for a solo rendition of “Strange Mercy,” then immediately followed it up with an outright rock onslaught of “Your Lips are Red” that featured the previously mentioned high-wire act.

• You can see the set here: http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/st-vincent/2014/house-of-blues-new-orleans-la-3cca1ab.html,
• and an extended gallery here: http://jalbum.net/a/1555651