Photos by Marc Fong // Written by Mike Frash //
Little Boots //
The Independent – San Francisco
September 24th, 2013 //
Electro-pop darling Little Boots took the stage at The Independent on Tuesday to belt out her self-empowering anthems that mostly revolve around relationships and the search for love. Victoria Hesketh seemed slightly hesitant at first, but she grew more comfortable as her performance unfolded. The crowd was a bit lethargic for this one, save for super fan number one who was front and center and danced ecstatically throughout with a flat brimmed Amish-like hat.
The translation of Little Boots’ music in a live environment is relatively faithful to her recorded work, but a handful of extended breakdowns and seamless transitions kept things moving at a steady pace. Based in 70s disco grooves, yet rooted in the now with electronic overlays and vocoder modulation, Hesketh’s sound can safely be classified as disco nouveau. She’s backed by a drummer and two keyboard players that create the synthesized elements on the fly quite effectively while Hesketh keeps her fingers on the master controls via a stylish stand-up podium.
The flat, projected visuals in Little Boots’ show were archaic, like something out of a screen saver from 2002. The fog that continuously pumped out of the venue infrastructure lent more effective visual enhancement then the visuals Ms. Boots brought with her.
The best highlight of the evening came at the encore, when Hesketh reappeared with a costume change and her most upbeat, dancy numbers. Little Boots sported a technicolor Rainbow Bright dress that lit up like the Electric Carnival Parade, changing colors to pulsating versions of “Remedy” and show-ender “Shake”. This impressive display of satisfying eye-candy got the entire crowd moving to the same beat as super fan number one.
During the extended outro for “Shake”, Little Boots took the flat brimmed hat off of super fan number one and placed it on her head like a crown as her dress started to spell out “S-H-A-K-E” one letter at a time. Hesketh may have begun the evening in a state of self-consciousness, but she ended it as empowered as her music, adding one final kiss into the mic to say goodbye.
MNDR put on a crazy-fun opening performance as well. Check out photos of Little Boots and MNDR shot by Marc Fong.
Leave a Reply