It has been nearly 16 long years since Feist has performed in Victoria. Her last appearance was at the Legislature lawn for BC150 celebrations in August 2008.
The 11-time Juno Award winner returned for her Multitudes Finale Tour at a sold out The Royal Theatre Sunday night. She performed a full two-hour show with no intermission. It wasn’t just a concert it was also part performance art and visual art show.
A large white sheet covered the front of the stage with an image projected onto it. That image ended up being the view from Feist’s cell phone somewhere backstage pointing to the ceiling. Show began with her picking up the phone wand walking through the back halls before entering the audience though a side door and walking around the theatre and interacting with audience members as the video continued to project on the stage.
She then stepped onto a platform in front of the stage where the orchestra pit normally is standing barely an arm’s length from the front row audience. After pointing the phone at the entire audience projecting a wide shot of the sold out crowd, she set the phone down to show her feet before starting the acoustic half of her set with ‘The Bad in Each Other’.
After a couple songs, Feist asked for a volunteer to take her phone and walk around to shoot whatever they felt like to project in the background while she performed. A person named “Charlie” took on the task. Feist then asked the audience that if anyone had any photos on their phones that were meaningful to them to share them as “Charlie” walked by with the cell phone camera. During a performance ‘The Redwing’ a number of audience photos were shown on the projector including flowers, children, landscapes, and even Victoria singer/songwriter Lindsay Bryan’s old Mayne Island family business.
At around the halfway point of the show, Feist recited some poetry before breaking out in an acapella verse of ‘I Took All of My Rings Off’ while performing some choreography in the audience aisle. She returned to the platform as the atmospheric sounds of keys and drums then came through the speakers. After Feist stepped up to the main stage the sheet fell to the floor revealing Feist’s band behind her to being the full band half of the set. We unfortunately don’t have photos of the band as media photographers could only cover the first part of the show.
A fairly unique aspect to the concert was the surround sound aspect to it. Unlike most concerts where the speaker arrays blast stereo sound to your face, Feist’s show also featured her vocal loops and recorded sounds coming from behind you.
The main part of the set concluded with the 2007 song that launched Feist to world-wide recognition, ‘1234’, albeit a arrangement very different from the iPod nano days.
Another white sheet covered the front of the stage again before the two-song encore. “Charlie” returned with the cell phone camera to shoot Feist performing ‘Woman Kind’ in the audience aisle dragging green sheet that acted as a green screen used for visual effects on the projection. The final song of the night was ‘Love Who We Are Meant To’.
Feist concluded the show by introducing the band and revealing, to those who hadn’t figured it out yet, that ****SPOILER ALERT*** “Charlie” was actually media artist and filmmaker Colby Richardson.
This show engaged the audiences ears with its surround sound. It immersed the audience as part of the the show with its interactive visuals and audience singing parts. And Feist performed with quick witted and endearing banter between songs. Those who were lucky enough to attend will remember this one for very long time.
The Multitudes Finale Tour continues with three days at The Commodore Ballroom in Vancouver (February 12, 13 and 14) then down the west coast to Seattle, Portland and California before concluding in Toronto.
