Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Chan Marshall's MFA meltdown

From "Cat Power: Chan Marshall reveals the secrets of her stability":

Phoenix: I remember your once telling me about your stage fright, and that made sense because you really were up there on your own or with very little accompaniment. Are you concerned that without the big band backing some of that stage fright will return?

Chan Marshall: No, no, no. I have less stage fright now because I don’t drink. I just feel more clear-headed. It was more difficult before because I was distancing myself from people. I was compounding my depression with alcohol and really pushing people away.

Might be time to revisit whatever cabinet those stability secrets are stored in. Mark E. Moon sent us the following dispatch from last night's 10 pm Chan Marshall solo gig at the Museum of Fine Arts:

It was pretty crazy. I just read all these interviews about how she doesn't lose it anymore on stage, she's sober, blah, blah, blah.

She looked calm and composed when she took the stage. she made a couple of jokes,chatted with someone in the audience and then started playing.

And then she freaked out.

She was immediately obssessing with the reverb (which in her defense wasn't working at first), then she couldn't take it when the sound guy was looking at her (first shielding her eyes, and then stopping halfway through a song to tell him he had to move), then she spent like 10 minutes trying to tune her guitar and it was STILL out of tune when she started up again, all the while starting songs and not getting through them (she was trying to do "House of the Rising Sun" over and over again).

She kept muttering, "I'm sorry, I'm SORRY," and "I'm not mad at anyone, I'm mad at myself", and "I'm just here to play music and sing songs, I didn't mean to make it into a big thing."

Finally after about 30 or so minutes, halfway through a song, she threw off her guitar, said "I gotta pee," and left the stage.

There was much murmuring. The woman next to us said she doubted that chan would come back. Some dude used this opportunity to put something on her chair (his demo? a love letter?). But she did come back, got it together, and did a fine set, though she couldn't remember what songs she had already done and still kept apologizing.

Live | MFA Indie Rock Series