Just getting back, great concert! She's such an artist, her music is very interesting and I just love her voice, many shades and dynamics and such control. She was fun onstage, pretty much acts - and dresses - like any "normal" person, not trying to be a rock star or anything. The venue was a local music bar, a good size stage with many levels of walkways and actually many bars around in different locations. (I had one beer and decided at $7 a glass that one was enough!) No seating, just standing general admission; it was pretty packed (maybe 300-400 people total? I'm not really sure it was hard to estimate), and we ended up being in a good spot, I thought, at stage right just a few feet from the stage, which you wouldn't think would have very good sound but actually we were close to the side stage monitor, so we could hear everything quite clearly without it being overly loud. I could hear the nuance in the vocals, which was the big reason I wanted to go to this show. And I was close enough to be able to watch the performers, I was maybe 20-25' from Neko, 15' from her bassist and 10' from her backup vocalist (who was also the pre-show soloist, very good too).
So in all it was a good time, well worth it. Very different experience from my last non-classical show - Joe B. Her band was not quite as tight and polished as Joe's, but they were all very talented, and I believe the drummer and lead guitarist were members of the New Pornographers, I'll have to look it up. She also had a bassist (electric and upright), backup vocalist, and an interesting fellow with wild gray hair who played guitar/banjo/pedal steel. A good mixture, definitely not mainstream pop/rock stuff. She played a lot of music from Middle Cyclone, and a bunch of other stuff from her earlier albums and even a few from a new album she says is coming out "soon." Probably onstage for ~1.5 hours, maybe a little more.
