Rising Star Chappell Roan Meets Her Moment With Ecstatic New York Show: Concert Review
variety.comJem Aswad Senior Music Editor If you’ve been to enough concerts, there’s a feeling you recognize when a new-ish artist’s career is about to blast off — when the audience isn’t just singing along with the hit but with nearly every song, half of them with hands over hearts, many dressed in the artist’s merch or artist-identifying outfits, and at least a few singing emphatically, with tears and/or mascara running.
That feeling isn’t always accurate, but it was present at Billie Eilish concerts in 2019 and Lorde’s club shows in 2013 and even the Killers almost 20 years ago — and without setting the bar unfairly high, it was definitely in the air Chappell Roan’s packed concert at New York’s 1,500-capacity Webster Hall on Tuesday night.
It comes from the songs and the artist’s presence and performance, of course, but it’s really more in how the audience is reacting to those things, like this artist is theirs, someone who’s speaking to or for or about them.
Like most of the above artists at those times, Chappell Roan isn’t really that new. The 25-year-old Missouri-born singer signed to Atlantic in her late teens, releasing an EP in 2017 and a string of singles, but her sound and profile didn’t really fall into place until shortly before the pandemic, when she began working with co-writer/producer Daniel Nigro — whose own career soon blasted off after he co-wrote and produced most of Olivia Rodrigo’s blockbuster “Sour” album.
Read more on variety.com