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By: Tom Reilly
Laura Marling :: 02.06.10 :: Swedish American Hall :: San Francisco, CA
At San Francisco's Swedish American Hall, the young and talented Laura Marling performed a fairly informal set of her poetic folk music to a sold out crowd of eager fans. Marling offered up several new tracks from her upcoming sophomore album, I Speak Because I Can (arriving March 23), as well as favorites from her 2008 debut, Alas, I Cannot Swim. She performed half of the show with members of opening act The Wheel and half on her own. Band or no, Marling filled the beautiful wooden hall with a very confident delivery.
Opening with a slew of new songs, Marling hit the stage and it was immediately evident that she has been on quite a journey since the English export's first gigs in the U.S. back in 2008. The newer tunes are noticeably more mature, melodically and structurally. They seemed louder and thicker than the musing, cyclical ballads from her first album. Marling too seems more mature. Still accepting calls of "happy birthday" from the audience, the British folk darling had turned just 20-years-old only a few days prior to the San Francisco gig. Heralded as wise and beyond her years, even at 18, she now seems to have come into her own a bit more. I saw her take the stage at the Bowery Ballroom in Manhattan in late 2008 and she appeared very much the teenager with nearly bleach blonde hair; a British Taylor Swift of sorts. These days Marling appears much more a woman and has abandoned her golden locks for a more somber shade of dark brown.
After a quick hello and a remark that San Francisco was lovely and "full of cheesecake," with her band behind her, she broke out four new songs for a welcoming audience. Lyrically not too much has changed, though her songs deal less with relationships or breakups than many of her peers. She employed phrases like, "No hope in the air/ No hope in the water," and "Deathly afraid of living." A sense of morbidity seems to run through the modern British folk scene and was certainly evident on her first record.
 Laura Marling |
Directing her audience to the band member performing a tongue-in-cheek, "dazzling" magic trick with a piece of rope and a metal ring, Marling took a minute to re-tune her guitar and then launched into her strongest number, "Ghosts." She played the first verse and chorus on her own with vocal harmonies over, "Lover, please do not fall to your knees/ It's not like I believe in everlasting love." The band then kicked in all at once and delivered the song beautifully. Demonstrating a very well rehearsed group the song came to an abrupt and decisive end with one final "everlasting love" and was met with a huge cheer.
Now alone onstage Marling played "My Manic and I," another favorite from her debut record. "Night Terror" followed with some extremely impressive whistling from the young singer replacing the violin on the studio version. Then, the only cover tune of the night, Neil Young's "The Needle and the Damage Done." A song taught to her by her father, Marling explained her mother had thought she had written it herself until her daughter (then in her teens) explained it was a song about heroin addiction. Next up came the new single from the upcoming album, "Goodbye England (Covered With Snow)." It's a really beautiful song and homage to the place she calls home. Written from the perspective of someone out on the road reminiscing about life back in England, she sings, "I never love England more than when covered in snow;" truly a great song and the best I heard all night.
Joined once more by her band, Marling then performed her anti-encore, saying she hates to leave the stage and rather just presumes that everyone would indeed like to hear one more. She closed out the set with the hidden track on her first album, "Alas, I Cannot Swim," clearly an audience favorite with a good number of folks singing right along. The gig definitely got fans excited to hear the new album and showed that Laura Marling is a talented young lady, both on the guitar and vocally, but most importantly as a songwriter who is coming into her own.
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