REVIEW: KT Tunstall @ The Sinclair 5/19
By Kate Evans
On Sunday the 19th KT Tunstall played a sold out show at The Sinclair in Cambridge. Opening the night was LA based alt-pop singer Maddie Ross and her producer and guitar player Wolfy. She opened the show with the first track “Hometown” off her debut EP Touch Hands, Touch Bodies. Ross shared the story of how she was brought on to the tour. She said she found out that KT Tunstall and Brandi Carlile were playing a festival together so she tweeted about it and Tunstall sent her a message about opening on tour. She then went in to a beautiful cover of “Kiss Me” by Sixpence None The Richer.
Ross shared that she and Wolfy met at USC and have been dating for five and a half years and that by now their lives are 500% intertwined. Ross said many people compare her songs to those in rom-coms so she and Wolfy decided to write an album where each song scores a different rom-com that they made up. One song off the album “The Riddle” is a song from Wolfy’s perspective her relationship with Ross but the twist is that it was written by Ross. She informed everyone that there was a station at her merch table to donate to The Trevor Project, a non-profit organization which focuses on suicide prevention in the LGBTQ+ community. She ended her set with two catchy pop songs, “Liv Tyler” and “You’re Still My Sugar” which the crowd loved.
After a quick set change 2000’s folk rocker KT Tunstall took the stage. She began by playing “In This Body” from her newest album Wax. Her energy was felt throughout the venue as the crowd started to sing and dance along. She shared with the audience that she worked with Nick McCarthy of Franz Ferdinand on the new record and the audience erupted in cheers. After asking the audience how they feel about mashups and 80’s pop music she went in to a cover of The Bangles’ “Walk Like an Egyptian” which many people in the audience were familiar with. The next song was “Ashes” and according to Tunstall it is a fan favorite and joked that the reason was because it is her only song with explicit language. To start the song, she pulled out a kazoo and the audience erupted into laughter and cheers. It was the best kazoo solo I’ve ever witnessed.
Her drummer, Cat, took a quick break and Tunstall began using the loop pedal. She told the story of her playing “Black Horse and a Cherry Tree” on Later…With Jools Holland, the song she attributes to helping her career take off. When she sang “Feel It All” she stepped away from the microphone, walked to the edge of the stage, and began singing while the audience stayed quiet to listen. Her voice boomed from all corners of the venue and sent chills down my spine.
As she moved in to the last part of her set she talked to the audience about why the second half of the tour was postponed. She said she was having health problems and refused to see a doctor until one day all the hearing in one ear was completely gone. She decided it was time and she was told she had vertigo and that she would need to take some time off touring. Meanwhile, her hearing in the other ear was getting worse. She felt her hearing would never return and anything that involved sound made her sad that it didn’t sound right. She said “I Won’t Back Down” by Tom Petty helped her get through it and pushed her to work on her hearing. Eventually her hearing returned to normal but only on one side. She performed the song for the audience as a reminder to learn to trust the advice they are given. She ended her set with “Suddenly I See” and the audience sang every word back to her.
