Regina Spektor is for Reals

The roar of cheers and applause that went up as Regina Spektor reappeared for her encore at the Paramount on Tuesday night was louder than anything else that night. All night, between songs, it had been "Regina, I love you!", "Regina, I love you more than that first girl!", and a baritone howl of "Regina, I want to have your babies!" Spektor, in contrast, traveled imperturbably from song to song, though the "babies" brought her up short. "All tour," she said, "it's been babies. I guess...thanks?"

If you were listening to her albums--Far is her latest--and debating about whether a live show was worth braving wind and cold, I can tell you it was. (Though if I had it all to do over again, I would have worn a scarf.) Spektor's ferocious talent puts her live show into life-flashing-before-your-eyes highlight-reel contention.

When she appears onstage, ducking and grinning shyly at the wave of applause headed her direction, you might not think "ferocious" is all that accurate or even appropriate. But when she's there alone on the stage singing "Silly Eye-Color Generalizations" a capella, full-throated, tenderly, mockingly, piercingly--over two thousand people are barely breathing.

Lyrically, she has a predator's ability to confound her prey so that you--little bunny rabbit, come for carrots--freeze right there, marveling at the silky verbal tricks. Vocally, she has very sharp teeth. One moment, she's a little breathy girl's bleat but with bounce, "It was so easy and the words so sweet", and then the mouth opens very wide and the voice gets very big and you would probably take a few steps back if your chair would let you. Still, even if she has you in tears or gibbering foolishly, she looks like she'd apologize profusely for having eaten the whole theater and gone to sleep.

Yes, she is acclimated, but she is a Russian bear. Do not forget this.

Her "Fidelity" in the encore was tinged with fatigue, coppery from repetitions stamped out concert after concert--this particular night, her heart was more given to "Love, You're a Whore," a country barn-dance throwback that materialized hay-filled rafters in beneath the gilded Paramount ceilings and rattled them with bittersweet resignation.