FILE: While sitting in a Seattle hotel lobby watching a very cute seal on TV , Jessica Lea Mayfield talked Elliott Smith and the power of songwriting ahead of her show at Denver s Larimer Lounge on Feb. 19.
When Jessica Lea Mayfield stepped up on the low stage at the Lost Lake last night, you could ve sworn she was a second stage hand. Or maybe a guitar tech, up to re-tune the artist’s two acoustics or adjust their straps. The modest crowd in the small-but-welcoming and warm venue almost didn t notice who she was until she walked up to the mic. Hi there,” she said in an unassuming, almost shy voice.
Related: Our interview with Jessica Lea Mayfield
This song is called Pure Stuff.’ Mayfield then dove into a three-song set starter that toyed with youthful visions of love intertwined with far-beyond-her-27-years heartache, loss and emotional devastation, including Nervous Lonely Night and a new song depicting a woman in domestic enslavement at the mercy of her stalker/partner.
These songs highlighted Mayfield s paradoxical charm: heavy minor power chords crushed out of an acoustic guitar that seemed strung with piano wire, heavily doused with a thick chorus-pedal mix, all juxtaposed with vocals that were impossibly smooth and designed to sneak up on you.
Related: Jessica Lea Mayfield plays Elliott Smith with Seth Avett (review)
Between songs, the audience almost paused to wait for permission before applauding, until Mayfield played the familiar Our Hearts Are Wrong, which inspired some swaying and singing along. She followed on with Hold You Close, I m Not Lonely Anymore and Seeing Stars, wrapping the audience up in her Elliott Smith influence and the visceral beauty of young love.
Mayfield s compositions are maturing — she played a number of new ones during her 80-minute set — into pieces that are recognizably hers. They re deeper and more ominous than her earlier work, and also more confident. The new songs she played last night recalled The Cure (from the Faith and Seventeen Seconds period, with a mixture of Cowboy Junkies and Neko Case) but were lyrically all Mayfield.
She ended her set-proper with Sleepless, but was sure to crouch down after the song to ask if the audience wanted her to play a few more, in her demure stage persona. They confirmed and Mayfield complied, proving that her stated childhood goal of playing music onstage was still the right choice.
