Neko Case (photo: Megan Cole)
By Megan Cole
I’m going to be honest, putting my feelings about Neko Case and her concert at the Vogue Theatre on April 15 into words is very difficult. I remember the first time I saw Case nearly a decade ago at Bumbershoot festival in Seattle. I had spent a few days downloading and listening to her songs before the festival, and was convinced she was an act that needed to be seen. Right when she strummed her first chord and sang her first note I was in awe and thought, “This is one of the best female singers and musicians I’ve heard.”
From the moment Case and her band walked on the Vogue stage, to their final bow, everyone in the packed theatre was enraptured and mesmerized by her breathtaking voice. But one of the things that’s the most enjoyable about watching Case, especially in more recent years, is to see her relationship with her band. To say the performance was flawless might seem like a bit of an exaggeration, but it was. Case’s voice was paired with her amazing background vocalist, Kelly Hogan, who rejoined the band that night after performing with The Decemberists. These two women may have been destined to sing together. During songs like “This Tornado Loves You,” or “Night Still Comes” the two powerhouse voices combined so beautifully together that it made it hard to imagine the two singing separately.
Neko Case and band (photo: Megan Cole)
The show took fans through Case’s catalogue, including songs such as “Deep Red Bells,” “Hold On, Hold On,” “Pretty Girls,” “The Pharaohs,” and “Man,” from her most recent album, The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You. Case and Hogan had my arms covered with goosebumps on more than one occasion during the show, and they also had the audience in stitches over their back and forth banter, including talk of removing Hogan’s skin tags with gun powder and a bottle of Wild Turkey. Other goosebump-inducing moments included virtually every song Jon Rauhouse played on the pedal steel, and when Case started “I Wish I Was the Moon” a cappella.
Every time I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Case since that day at Bumbershoot, I’ve been reminded of why she’s one of the best, and why her songs, through all the years I’ve been listening to them, stand the test of time, and Wednesday night was no exception.
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