Reflections of Darkness - Music Magazine - Emilie Autumn

Details: Written by: Carsten Leopold; Published: 07 December 2007

Zeche Carl, Essen, Germany
5th December 2007
Emilie Autumn & Lucas Lanthier

On Wednesday the 5th December we went to Essen to the charismatic little location "Zeche Carl" to visit EMILIE AUTUMN at her THE ASYLUM FOR WAYWARD VICTORIAN GIRLS TOUR I. Special Guest on this first part of the tour was LUCAS LANTHIER. The audience at the venue was quite mixed. In the front rows, the younger generation took place while in the back the older aged people were standing. After a little waiting time the evening started with a wired guy…

Lucas Lanthier

LUCAS LANTHIER is the founder and front man of the theatrical DEADFLY ENSEMBLE, as well as founding member and front man of the art-rock group CINEMA STRANGE. He also performs solo acoustic/cabaret shows that, while they entail a fair amount of music, both folky and operatic, are often bizarre enough to border on performance art frontiers. http://www.cinemastrange.nightmarezone.de/ / http://www.myspace.com/lucaslanthier

Music & Performance
The set ran about 30 minutes and consisted of a few songs from the both projects of LUCAS LANTHIER: CINEMA STRANGE and DEADFLY ENSEMBLE. All songs were performed with an acoustic guitar only which was played in a perfect way, even though the music and especially the chant must have sounded quite strange in several people’s ears. The performance of LUCAS LANTHIER was very strange too and in my opinion intense overacted. He entered the stage clothed like a woman with a white dress like a wedding dress, with pigtails in the hair and on high heels. Lucas ran a bizarre show with an acoustic guitar and a very strange vocal-performance. It was more a theatrical than a concert. It didn't please me and I was glad when the show was over. But I guess that kind of performance, as overacted and cabaret-like as it is, is surely a matter of taste. As for the light show, there was not much variation. The light was static and monochrome.

Rating
Music: 6
Performance: 6
Sound: 8
Light: 6
Total: 6.3

Emilie Autumn

After the obligatory change over break, the show went on with the headliner EMILIE AUTUMN. She is a singer and violinist, currently living in Chicago and well-known for her theatrical performance style. Combine the violin mastery of Nigel Kennedy, the voice of an Alien-Siouxsie-Bowie hybrid, and the looks of a post-apocalyptic Marie Antoinette, and what do you get? EMILIE AUTUMN! The pink-haired princess of "Victoriandustrial" has already morphed her way from classically trained violin prodigy to extreme rock performer with the ability to shred on a fiddle à la Yngwie, and with a cult following to match. After spending a summer in France recording with Courtney Love at Ms. Love's express command, Emilie was invited to join Love's touring band, THE CHELSEA, and was appropriately dubbed the "anarchy violinist" by Love.

Next thing you knew, she was performing live on The Late Show with David Letterman, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and on national television with Billy Corgan of SMASHING PUMPKINS fame, while appearing on the solo debut albums of both, Corgan and Love. Emilie quickly gained attention as a solo performer in her own right, and was chosen as one of Interview Magazine's "14 To Be", a pictorial featuring 14 up-and-coming young female stars. The current album, ‘A Bit o' This & That’ was released in August 2007. On Stage this time EMILIE AUTUMN was supported by 3 of "Her Bloody Crumpets": Veronica Varlow, Vecona and The Lady Aprella. http://www.emilieautumn.com/ / http://www.emilieautumn.de/ /
www.myspace.com/emilieautumn

Music
The set consisted of 14 songs, taken from different periods of band history. It started by ‘4 O' Clock’ - the upcoming single which will be released in January 2008, followed by older well-known songs like ‘Opheliac’, ‘Liar’ or ‘The Art Of Suicide’. Outstanding were the live played instrumentals and the virtuous violin parts of Emilie, not that outstanding was, that she sang at least partly playback. The show ran about 95 minutes and finished by ‘Thank God I'm Pretty’.

Performance
The stage was decorated trashy and fanciful with a lot of utensils like dolls, a teddy bear, pillows, teapot, teacups, a skull and lots of other things. At the right side of the stage was a big white screen like a big antiquarian mirror arranged which was illuminated from behind. The show itself was dominated by overwhelming visual impressions, it was a kind of theatrical with electro sound. EMILIE AUTUMN and her "abigails" were dressed in imaginative baroque costumes and the performance was very theatrical and real eye candy because the girls were very beautiful and luscious. During the show they were singing and dancing, changing some clothes, drinking and eating and playing with their toys which were arranged all over the stage.

The main part of music was played from tape, only a few parts of keyboard and violin were played live and the vocals - at least a part - were sang live. The lightshow was very colourful and fitting to the imaginative stage setting. After about 1.5 hours, the girls finished and left the stage. The crowd requested an encore, but the girls came back only for dispensing some candies and left the stage again and finally without one more song. I guess that was part of the very stylish theatrical performance.

Setlist
01. 4 O'Clock
02. Opheliac
03. Swallow
04. Liar
05. The Art of Suicide
06. I Want My Innocence Back
07. Instrumental
08. God Help Me
09. Misery Loves Company
10. Dead is the New Alive
11. Let the Record Show
12. Instrumental
13. Mad girl
14. Thank God I'm Pretty