KT Tunstall

For only having a couple of albums out, KT Tunstall has an incredible number of distinctive and wonderful songs. And she was having a blast last night at the Orpheum, performing with high energy for close to 2 hours. Not many songs were given new interpretations aside from being entirely acoustic instruments (except the keyboard), but the live performance did give fresh echoes at various points of early Cowboy Junkies and Natalie Merchant. I’d really love to see her in a venue with good acoustics some day. Can’t complain about our seats, though—directly on the center aisle 13 rows from the stage, with the two seats in front of us empty until the encores.

Paddy Casey from Ireland (in Boston to find his roots, as he put it) did a good opening set, though I did wonder how much of the DSM he was going to cover in a single set. Depression, fear, and loss were recurrent themes. As someone who happily listens to Pink Floyd and 4AD artists like This Mortal Coil and Dead Can Dance, I can go along with that. But for me, the real star of his set was Fiona Melady, who accompanied him on keyboard and took the lead for one beautiful song of her own. I love hearing new music this way.