Joan As Policewoman

Union Chapel
4 October 2009

After the first song Joan Wasser was obviously warming up nicely, as she removed her jacket to reveal, in its full glory, her pink leopardskin-print off the shoulder jumpsuit. The red and blue striped boots added a nicely judged vertical accent to the ankle area.

Partner-in-crime Timo Ellis sported an ankle-length jacket in a matching print - on a neutral backing, thankfully - and thus a kitsch theme was well established, and in danger of running away with things, given that Britney (well, Team Britney, presumably) was the origin of song 2. This was followed by an Iggy Pop tune and a rising fear that the whole evening was going to be unmemorable covers of songs I don't know, as - ta dah! - Joan explained her new covers album, called, er, Cover.

In fact she explained not only that, but also the splendidly post-modern cover version of her covers album which, if I understood correctly, is only on sale at the live shows. As I was there on the basis of her two previous albums, the gorgeous ones without any covered tunes, the next hour was threatened by rain clouds....

Happily the sun shone through instead, and there followed a mix of new and familiar JAPW tracks alongside some better-judged Hendrix and Bowie tunes, and a drums-and-vocals cover of recent Sonic Youth track Sacred Trickster which was reminiscent of the recent Wildbirds & Peacedrums set at the same venue.


Not all clear blue skies though; before playing a song based around She Watched Channel Zero, Joan was caught out trying to unearth anyone who had been to see Public Enemy 20 years ago, as she had - a slightly awkward moment as she was clearly anticipating a greater response, but a couple of stifled cheers suggested not many had been down with that particular shizz. I think she was mistaking a JAPW crowd for JAPW herself; in my experience musicians are often open to all flavours, but that doesn't mean their fans are.

Best cover of all was the third and final part of the encore, Nina Simone's Keeper Of The Flame, featuring a fine mariachi-style baritone ukelele solo. Joan has an amazing voice, ranging from almost falsetto down to contralto, as some of the simplest arrangements helped to demonstrate; the singer playing the keyboard was the surest bet of the various combinations the duo tried during the set. Ultimately it felt as if there had been some fine moments, but the performance didn't quite hit the heights one suspects it might be able to, and so the mood in the venue likewise didn't respond as I have seen it do on other occasions.

The careful reader may notice that a number of the features of the evening mentioned above do not, typically, occur at shows. There were also, to balance the books, a selection of gig tropes to be found:

- unsatisfactory support act who were pleased to be there
- terrible sound mix for the support act, much better for the headliner
- endless pauses for guitars to be retuned
- everyone thanking everyone else for everything (support act, sound engineer, the audience etc)
- everyone being expected to applaud any mention of London, the existence of the Union Chapel etc
- preordained understanding that there would be an encore
- unconvincing attempt at a standing ovation from a few hardcore Joansters, when the atmosphere just wasn't really there