Cat Soul Power

Chan Marshall finally shows her stagewise authority at The Roundhouse in Camden, London.

It’s incredible to think that seven years ago Chan Marshall, a.k.a Cat Power, almost gave up writing original songs altogether. Back then, the Memphis-born, New York based singer released a covers album that, oddly for such a venture, became a minor classic. She has since overcome any songwritng reticence, though, but it is only with this years’ The Greatest that a major breakthrough has been palpable. Marshall was aware of that, too. Last night, much of that album’s understated guile and soulful strains was played out with utter conviction and authority.

It undoubtedly helped that the Memphis Horns were bought over to add further dimension and detail. Of course, it’s not that Marshall needed extra frills to make her wistful alt.country songs come alive; but they surely provided enough discipline to prevent her from getting, shall we say, side-tracked.

In the past, Marshall’s live shows have been the stuff of car-crash nightmares, all drunken chit-chat and rudderless songs that go on forever. Last night was very different. While the eye-shielding fringe and hunched stage movements were still in-place, the ability to face and play upfront seemed shockingly new and, more importantly, welcome. As such, Marshall and the Memphis horns' display of lulling country-soul was nigh-on unassailable.

After a blaring and honking cabaret revue style intro - complete with worrying signs of slap-bass - The Greatest’s shimmering, hammock-swaying title track inaugurated Marshall’s on-stage appearance. With her ‘boxing-champ’ fists resembling a playful kitten, she unwittingly (or deliberately?) demonstrated that songs questing, but doubting, tenor perfectly. Rarely has a song about ego-stroking meditation sounded so, so…sombre.

Elsewhere, the slo-mo, quasi-doowop Lived In Bars and the balmy breeze of Willie only emphasised the rarefied plane Marshall was working on here. Commendably, she was neither adopting Southern-soul styles for affectation; nor were the Horns awkwardly bolted on. Instead, their languid but fluid style both suited and played up to Marshall’s ricocheting, melodic prowess. Only the unravelling Where Is My Love bordered on the self-consciously worthy.

Far better was the plangent, psychedelic clouds of The Moon, a master class in making economical arrangements sound big and bold. Round one, so to speak, was an unqualified success.

Nevertheless, even without the Memphis Horns, Marshall couldn’t do that much wrong anyway. Dipping back into her ‘covers period’, a ghostly, spectral reading of The House of the Rising Sun by The Animals obliterated any groaning familiarity. Perched behind a piano, she couldn’t resist drawling anecdotes about Nick Rhodes and Courtney Love to a neck-craning audience. ‘Hey…they both love that (covers) record…wow,’ which either suggested saucer-eyed impressionability or withering contempt. From this angle, it was hard to tell.

The covers continued with a returning Memphis Horns pile-driving through an over-heated reading of The Rolling Stones (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction, while an accapella sprint through Smoky Robinson’s Tracks of My Tears sounded slightly forced. Still, as the menacing, climbing chords of Marshall’s own Love and Communication filled the air, you wonder why, on this form, she bothered with covers at all.