SHOWS // Half Waif @ Doug Fir Lounge
Post by J
Dusty rose clouds, a piece of paper with flames slowly curling at the edges, intricate details of a flower, flashes of light across an inky blue space, like shooting stars. Familiar images, but edged with the surreal — zoomed in, limited palettes, at times hyperreal: just unfamiliar enough to evoke a sense of motion, like being transported somewhere just slightly out of the realm of the known.
These were the kinds of moving images projected on the screen behind Nandi Rose Plunkett, the woman behind Half Waif, at the Doug Fir Lounge in Portland, Oregon on February 24th. I’ve seen Plunkett’s keyboard/synth/pedal setup described as a “spaceship” and, after seeing her live, no other descriptor could be more apt.
Half Waif’s most recent album “Lavender” is centered around motion, conveying a necessary, almost mournful familiarity with movement and migration; being perpetually in transit, uprooted. “Lavender” is a rich universe; it is complex, tangled with conflicting emotions, deeply personal, but still welcoming. In the same way that the best sci-fi works present us with a world that is both awe-inspiring for the possibilities it creates and acutely realistic for the mirror it holds up to our own world and our own lives, Plunkett’s carefully and precisely constructed sonic galaxies show us that we can always survive the unfamiliarity that is often thrust upon us. We can make it our own.
Being in motion, being moved. The slow, subtle motions of the projected videos, the deep percussive vibrations filling the small venue to its brim, Plunkett’s ever-present shadow, a darkness moving against the color, negative space moved so deeply by the music. I could tell she felt every ounce of sound in the way she moved to the music, physically conveying the emotional depth elicited by the beautifully built layers of synth. Her dancing felt almost choreographed for how perfectly it matched the beats emanating from her stacked keyboards, but was still clearly spontaneous. There’s something so simply powerful in seeing that the music means as much to the artist as it means to you.
Being moved. Before playing “Leveler”, Plunkett remarked on the song’s emotional gravity, and I was surprised to find a lump in my throat when I remembered my own emotional attachments to the heartachingly resonant ode to loss and grief. While Plunkett’s songs often sound mournful, there is always resilience edging her unwavering vocals, a soft power in vulnerability and crying out. After spending almost a year knowing these songs, locating a small piece of home in them, finally being able to physically feel them live, heart buzzing with the bass, feet moving to the beat, singing every word back, was at once both a beautiful escape and a necessary return, a revisitation and celebration of past things lost and new things found.
Buy Lavender here.