Live Report: Regina Spektor at the Bord Gais Energy Theatre

Regina Spektor told her crowd at the Bord Gais theatre that something about the place “feels enchanted,” and suggested it was leftover from the performance of Grease the previous night.

But the Russia-born, New York-reared pianist, with her whimsical songs and giddy modesty, wove a spell of her own as she welcomed a devoted audience into the “surreal part of [her] mind” throughout a 26-song set.

A theatre venue suited Spektor, as she spun fanciful vignettes about the characters who populate her songs. From the tongue-to-teeth cymbal sound as ‘Eet’ fades out, to the guttural “oh’s” peppering the multilingual ‘Après Moi’, Spektor proved herself as masterful an aural storyteller as any Broadway star.

The audience were deathly quiet while Spektor performed, backed by a drummer, cellist and keyboardist. At the end of each song when crushed with cheers and applause she would drag her shoulders up to her ears, bow her head and give a “thank you,” as though surprised her music was so well received.

Spektor took to whispering into the mic between songs, so her rage toward the current US political system as she introduced ‘Ballad Of The Politician’ was jarring. She dedicated the song to the “magical fucking forces that can get the pussy-grabbers out.”

The classically-trained songstress continued to counteract her doe-eyed stage presence throughout the show, with the twistedly playful ‘Small Bill$’ and (somewhat clumsily) guitar-driven ‘Bobbing For Apples’ in which she bluntly refrains “someone next door is fucking to one of my songs”.

Spektor bewitched her three full tiers of fans as she crashed through ‘Obsolete’ and bounced into ‘Don’t Leave Me [Ne Me Quitte Pas]’. Her botched lyrics to ‘On The Radio’ rendered the song more compelling and equally tear-inducing.

The beloved Bronx girl hadn’t graced Ireland’s shores since 2013, and the wait for her encore felt just as long while the audience rattled the Bord Gais from foundation to roof. Eventually she came back with ‘Fidelity’ and the dance-y ‘Hotel Song’ that Vodafone drilled into our ears in ‘07.

The night ended with just Regina and her piano on ‘Samson’, delivered with enough honeyed emotion to carry over the years until her next Irish performance.