VANCE JOY AND ELLE KING EXCITE THE ELDERLY
BY MEGAN MCCOY
W ith the sassy and sarcastic Elie King
op en in g for the sw eet and ch arm in g
Vance Joy, I knew I was in for a show to
remember. Both Elie King and Vance Joy
have had extremely popular songs over
the last year and I w as very excited to
see them both on Feb. 23 at the Arlene
Schnitzer Concert Hall for the “ Fire and
the Flood” tour.
I had never been to “ The S c h n itz ”
before and 1 was pleasantly surprised.
It w as a b ea u tifu l, classy ven ue w ith
chandeliers h an gin g in the lobby and
lovely old architecture. As I looked around,
I began to notice that a lot o f the people
around me appeared to be as old as the
concert hall itself. It was a really odd mix
o f ages all together; there were quite a
few elderly attendees as well as children.
I didn’ t understand what the draw was.
Although Vance Joy was the headliner,
I w as equally excited to see Elie King.
She hit the stage w ith a bang. She belted
out her song “ Devil” and addressed the
audience. W ith a beer in one hand and
the mic in the other she had the audience
cracking up at her cynical, sarcastic sense
o f humor. Still, I felt like she was holding
back. Maybe it was because of the audience
or the classy venue, but the whole night
she only said one curse word and said she
wasn’t going to sing her cover of the song
J
Illustration by Saige Keikkala
8 Clackamas Print MARCH 2.2016t hed acka masprintcom
“ M y N eck , M y B ack ” afte r people fro m
th e audience kep t sh o u tin g it.
A t one point she said th at we should be
proud o f her because she h a d n ’ t cursed
yet during her set and she m entioned that
there were children in the audience. I was
kin d o f disappointed because I w anted to
see Elie in all o f h er rau n ch y glory, b u t
h er m u sic w as great and I still th o u g h t
she w as a bad ass.
V an ce Jo y started h is set w ith o ne o f
h is b ig g e s t h its an d m y fa v o rite o f h is
son gs “ M ess is M in e .” The w hole crowd
san g alo n g w ith Jam es K e o gh , th e voice
b e h in d V a n c e Jo y , w ith ju s t as m u c h
fe e lin g as th e artist h im s e lf. T hroughout
h is w h ole set there w as em o tio n beh in d
every w ord, probably because he w rites
h is ow n so n gs, b u t I really enjoyed th at
about h is p erfo rm ance. T hrou gh ou t the
n ig h t h e w as really d o w n -to -e a rth and
ch arm in g; h e had m ost o f th e audience
sw ooning. Y e s, even th e old fo lk s.
T h e n ig h t e n d ed w ith “ F ire an d th e
Flo od” and it was ju st as pow erful as the
fir s t so n g o f th e n ig h t. O v e ra ll, it w as
an e v e n in g fille d w ith great m u sic at a
beautiful venue. B oth Elie King and Vance
Jo y are very talen ted live and I w ould go
see b o th o f th em again w hen th ey’ re back
in th e area.