Review: Mount Eerie @ The Sinclair 4/18

Photo credits: Genevieve Elverum

Review by: Miguel Gonzales

Nearing the last two songs of Mount Eerie’s set, frontman Phil Elverum asks a question to the audience. “I was curious if anyone here was at the show I played at the cafeteria at Harvard, in like, I don’t know, 2000 or something?” Everyone in the audience was hesitant to answer his question, but only a rumble of chuckles emerged from them. “Was anyone even born yet?” Elverum followed up. The laughter became louder. A guy replies in the audience seconds later, saying that he was two years old in 2000, and Elverum responds with a gentle “nice.” Elverum asks a similar question,n asking if anyone has seen him play at The Brattle Theater, and someone in the audience on the far right blurts out a big “Yeah!”. “That [show] was fun,” Elverum replied. 

Most of the audience appeared to contain young college students, along with a speckle of high schoolers who managed to bring in their hefty backpacks (and were kind of annoying). The older crowd stood near the back, or were on top of the balcony, watching Phil and his backing band from afar. It doesn’t hurt to say this was some of the audience’s first Mount Eerie show, including me.

Phil Elverum has been a critical darling and a long-standing figure in US indie for some time. The prolific singer-songwriter’s career has been going strong for almost two decades, creating some of the most celebrated albums and projects in indie rock. Starting The Microphones in the early nineties in Olympia, Washington, and naturally transitioning to Mount Eerie has fixed Elverum’s ever-expanding musical endeavors in the hearts of many listeners. What draws me and so many others into Phil’s music is his earnest reflection of himself, his world, his surroundings, and experiences. It isn’t just reflected in his songwriting, but woven through his naturalistic approach to production itself. Coming off his 2024 album, “Night Palace,” Elverum’s gift in creating intimate and vulnerable moments is still there — a full palette of all the sounds and emotions he’s explored throughout his discography. What was intimate and welcoming was his performance at The Sinclair, as well. 

Opening for Mount Eerie first was Precious Bane, the solo project of Noel Gilson, who makes up one-half of the American black metal duo Ragana. For the brief twenty minutes Precious Bane was performing, Gilson’s set was ominous and cavernous, yet surprisingly minimal and dense in sound. Gilson’s setup consisted of her Rickenbacker guitar, an assortment of distortion pedals, Vox, and a Shruti box. Gilson’s vocals float on top of the drones from the droning Shruti box, while creating some loud, rumbling guitar drones from the pedals she turned on. As Gilson moves her right calf pushing in and out of the Shruti box, she wields her guitar and moves it in different directions, creating some minor feedback while gently picking on the bottom strings.

After Precious Bane’s set, Australian-based singer-songwriter Hana Stretton came on around 8:30 p.m. Stretton’s setup was bare compared to Precious Bane stripped to the most simple elements: an acoustic guitar, a Shruti box with a foot pedal, a sampler, vox, and a wooden percussion box she put both her feet on. A simple setup still has the ability to produce gorgeous sounds, and Hana Stretton’s set was exceptional at this. The field recordings and ambient sounds she played from her sampler, the soft prancing rhythms from the percussion box she produces with her feet, the lovely touches of the Shruti box drones on certain songs and the gentle strumming of her guitar — it’s one of those rare moments where the hair raises from your arms, sedated by the gorgeous sounds from one person. Stretton’s vocals took the spotlight, as the drifting gentleness and temporal quality of her voice is beautifully divine, something I think a lot of people needed to hear. The luscious soundscapes and delicate warmth Stretton exerts are too beautiful not to produce tears, and too heavenly not to immerse yourself in Stretton’s wonderful soundscapes. 

Hana Stretton’s music has a special force on you, and her one-man performance establishes her as an act I’m just fortunate to see. Hearing her talk about the cows she raised and her job as a farmer in Australia not only speaks to how she translates her experiences through sound, but also to produce sounds that feel like you’re there alongside Stretton. I don’t think many artists are able to vividly capture. 

At around 9:10 p.m., Phil Elverum and his backing band for the Night Palace tour walked on stage to their separate places. Both Noel Gilson and Maria Stocke of Ragana make their way on the left side of the stage, while Elverum and Jenn Moonbrick stand near the right side, with all of them setting up. Phil Elverum’s cozy blue cardigan and white cargo pants seem to warrant a calming set, but as he hits one of his white pedals with his tan sandals, it’s a much different story. Elverum squats downward as he tinkers with the settings of each pedal, slowly turning each of them on. His guitar is already on his shoulders, meanwhile ,a warm drone of white noise is produced from it. The noise is abruptly affected once he turns on another pedal, the overdrive and distortion flooding through the venue. It’s the Mount Eerie way of beginning a set. 

With the addition of Ragana and Moonbrick, all of them really complement each other for an hour-long set. The scorching indie rock ballad “Huge Fire,” the sweeping miniature “Broom of Wind” and the pleasantly cathartic “I Walk” are played with subtle finesse and sways gently. Stocke keeps the groove up, while Gilson’s bass playing thumps and sounds charming. Moonbrick’s background vocals and synth playing are a lovely addition to these songs, while Elverum’s songwriting and singing are still up-to-par, as in soft, contemplative, and honest. He doesn’t hold back, particularly when explaining the blistering, dark “Non-Metaphorical Decolonization,” a song about living in North America and incentivizing consciousness of the once Indigenous land we live in.

“What would be a good, post-USA world — would that be possible? That’s what I was imagining when making this song . . . We’re here in this very old place where colonialism was really tuned, and then sent out, and it’s fucked. I don’t know what that means to be in the heart of the place where the thing grew, but here we are,” Elverum said. 

In addition to the newer songs from Night Palace, the setlist includes one oldie but a goodie from Elverum’s catalog, “Voice in Headphones.” What threw me off guard from the live rendition was the inclusion of drums, which the original didn’t have. Stocke’s drum playing is loose and slackerish, while Elverum and Moonbrick’s vocal melodies are beautiful, playing off one another as each person sings a different part. Gilson’s bass playing is a nice touch to the chill demeanor, it’s light and not too stern. Elverum gets the audience to sing along to the chorus, as the band is greeted with a unanimous “It’s not meant to be a strife / It’s not meant to be a struggle uphill,” which made for a fun moment. What was also fun was the Nirvana and Ella Langley covers they performed. When they all played “Something In The Way” everyone was kind of phoning it in, but that was probably the point. With “weren’t for the wind,” they played it with full-on swagger, simply having fun with it.

What feels like you’re being transported in an amalgamation of influences, sounds, and emotions, Elverum and his backing band showcase all of these with ease. Even with the variety of serious-in-tone and goofy moments, it’s good to know that Elverum has still got it.