Dessa – Yes, Manchester; May 18th, 2024
For the longest time I’d been wanting to see Dessa live, but whenever she came to Europe at all it was during Iceland Airwaves so I was otherwise occupied. Thus, wen she announced two concerts in the UK for May I jumped at the chance and immediately bought tickets. I don’t know her music all that well and it’s not my genre in general, but I do know that her lyrics are really clever and my friend K. assured me she was amazing live. It’s all true, I thoroughly enjoyed the show.
Taking a morning bus to Manchester, I had lots of time when I arrived. went to the venue to make sure the time printed on the ticket meant “doors” and not “show start” and went off to the movies in the afternoon. It was a beautiful day and I even had some time in the sun before returning to the venue. Got in line at the door t the Pink Room at 7 and was still the first one, only joined by a few others about ten minutes later. When they opened at 7:30 there were still few of us and we all got a nice spot. The room was indeed pink and felt cozy somehow.
A short, 30 minute wait and Begonia stepped on stage, her outfit matching the surroundings. She told us that she and her pianist were from Canada and joked she would offer 30 minutes of pure rock. I don’t really know how to classify what she played, but it was rather beautiful. She has a great voice and her lyrics were good too. I enjoyed the variety, from songs about being queer, to moving away from religion to only needing a man “from Market street to the hot dog stand”. I enjoyed her set very much.
Setlist
Juniper
Heaven
Marigold
Butterfly
Hot Dog Stand
It’s too quiet
In the next halt hour, the room filled considerably and people came closer too. The excitement was palpable and everyone erupted into cheers when Dessa and her band walked on stage. She kicked off the show with ‘Hurricane Party’ and the people around me were singing along to every word. I loved it and from the first moment I was drawn into the show. Her backing singer/harpist Aviva and keyboarder Joshua were excellent and I was immediately smiling.
They continued with ‘Warsaw’ into ‘Velodrome’ or ‘Wardrome’ as the setlist read. I barely understood all the words, they came so fast, but it didn’t matter. The phrases I caught were enough to love everything about it. She told us how excited she was to be there “half across the world to find this”. I sure was happy I came. The music was far from what I usually listen to, yet so good and the lyrics were bloody amazing. I sent thoughs of thanks to K. without whom I would have never discovered Dessa.
I loved the sing along part on ‘Call of your Ghost’ (meaning there was a line I could actually sing along to, because it was easy to learn ;)) and found myself moving along to the music all evening. The first song I recognized was ‘Skeleton Key’ and I even remembered some of the lyrics. When I looked around I marveled at everyone knowing all the words to all the songs – so cool!
After that she told us she wrote a tiny book of poetry and told us how she played underground clubs for a long time, then read us ‘How to Stage Dive’, “An instructional manual for life as a musician”. It was fantastic and we laughed a lot throughout.
After the great ‘Terry Gross’ she gave a shoutout to Becky at merch and joked how she’d seen most of us on the street before the show and noted that it was really sweet to see “all the women’s study majors” explaining the songs. She then generalized that they were the ones dragging new people to the show, while looking at the people to my left. It was really funny when the woman replied “He dragged me here!” 😀 The great ‘Decoy’ followed, starting with “Not a wifepiece, or a sidepiece, I’m a thinkpiece” – before the show I had seen just that quote on a lyrics card, sold at the merch. She also had necklaces saying “Thinkpiece” in her handwriting. what a cool merch idea.
Dessa joked about Americans reading a menu and not wanting to admit “how the British say the food words” and how some of he vegetables sound so much better in British English. 😉 A few “slow, sentimental songs” followed, first ‘Crash’, including Aviva playing harp. Afterwards she mentioned a conversation upon checkin, when being asked what a harp was, she explained it as “the angel one”. Then we got an amazing acoustic version of ‘Blush’. <3
She had only old pound notes in her pocket and wanted to con someone into buying drinks “I didn’t know money could just rot in your pocket”. She found several volunteers 🙂 They played a great version of ‘Good Grief’ and got their well deserved drinks delivered. The soundboard died, but Dessa decided the sound was great and thanked Leo, the sound man. ‘I already like you’ gave me another chance to sing a little. At the end Joshua got out a saxophone. It was awesome! He also got extra credit for realizing the sax mic was of and switching to the vocals one.
Dessa thanked Begonia and mused that we might see her on a much bigger stage next time around. ‘Jumprope’ and ‘Fighting Fish’ followed, then we got another poem, called ‘Tits on the moon’ – I was fantastic. ‘Tell me again’ included more saxophone. At one point during the nigh, the woman to my right was filming and Dessa grabbed her phone, held it to her face and kept filming, turning it towards the audience and again towards the band before giving it back. 🙂
An amazing version of ‘5 out of 6’ and the cool ‘Fire Drills’ with a great clap-along ended the set, before we got ‘Dixon’s Girl’ as an encore. The whole show was fantastic, I could have listened for much longer. 😀
Went to the merch, but didn’t have cash and PyPal would not cooperate. Becky promised to kep a poetry book for me until London. Since I didn’t have anything to sign, I decided to leave, knowing I’d get another show the next day.
Setlist
Hurricane Party
Warsaw / Velodrome
Rome / Call Off Your Ghost
The Crow / Skeleton Key
Poetry Reading (‘How To Stage Dive’)
Terry Gross
Decoy
Crash (Acoustic)
Blush (Acoustic)
Good Grief
I Already Like You
Jumprope
Fighting Fish
Poetry Reading (‘Tits on the Moon’)
Tell Me Again
5 Out of 6
Fire Drills
Dixon’s Girl