She’s getting married in a fortnight, she says matter-of-factly, so this short tour represents Martha Wainwright’s “last burst of freedom”. However, when she comes to that show-stopping, too-gauche-to-be-anything-other-than-truthful line in ‘Far Away’, and grins as she sings, “I have no children, I have no husband, I have no reason to live” – it’s clear that (to use Gary Lightbody’s term) the dark angel of Montreal is in joyous form.
Not that you would guess from the new material she plays tonight.
If her debut album traded in adolescent dreads and terrors, and never quite managed to shake the impression of being marooned outside of life, looking hungrily through the windowpane – when this new record is released (in January, she says) we’ll find that Martha has been busy by the fireside tucking in. So, we hear about her accepting lifts from dubious characters in blacked-out limousines; making threatening noises about calling a lover’s wife; being shunned in the street by children. In ‘George’, she even sings about a friend’s recent suicide.
It’s awesomely dark and compelling stuff, helped in no small part by the spooky, folk-noir bedding. It’s an awful bore these days to use the words Drake and Nick when reviewing a singer-songwriter, but blame Martha, not me – her new stuff’s forced me into it.
That Martha is as convincing a Red Riding Hood as she is a Big Bad Wolf provides grounds for acclaim. That she can occupy both roles while wearing a frankly ludicrous pair of shorts is cause for wonder.
It’s one of those nights, though, so she carries the look off with ease.
‘G.P.T.’ and ‘Factory’ are given a welcome run out; an intense ‘This Life’ threatens to take the roof off; while she occupies ‘Love Is A Stranger’ by The Eurythmics, and converts it into a charging soul-buddy of ‘Born To Run’.
Even ‘Ball And Chain’, her worst and most hysterical moment, is brought to a premature end when Martha first breaks a string and then forgets the words. We really are in luck.
Pausing to try to flog us panties embossed with the title of her most famous song, she plays ‘Bloody Motherfucking Asshole’ and totters off with a wave and massive smile.
It’s been quite a fling while it’s lasted – but look: there goes the bride.