GO Show feat. Bishop Briggs and Shaed at Fine Line Music Cafe, Minneapolis (28 Apr 2017)

Wild horses couldn’t keep fans streaming like a river into the Fine Line Music Café for the latest sold-out GO Show, headlined by up-and-comer Bishop Briggs.

The event was another in the series promoted by local station GO 96.3, which has only been in existence for just over two years, but has developed a reputation for championing new alternative/indie acts and helping bring them to town, in the form of these showcase concerts. 

Opening the three-band evening was the curiously named Manatee Commune (aka Seattle artist Grant Eadie), an instrumentalist that blends his two loves of electronic and classical music, into a pleasing danceable mix of his own.  After a couple of EPs, he released a self-titled debut (on Bastard Jazz Recordings) and has been slowing building buzz- live, he mostly played in darkness in front of a screen showing visuals while playing viola, working his console, or jumping about with the crowd to the beat.

Next up was Washington DC electro-pop trio Shaed (pronounced “shade”), a trio featuring twin brothers Max and Spencer Ernst (evolving from their previous group The Walking Sticks) and singer Chelsea Lee and who recently released their debut EP of self-professed “colorful music”, Just Wanna See (Caroline/Photo Finish Records). 

Taking their name from the sci-fi trilogy Kingkiller Chronicle, a shaed is a type of cloak made out of shadows created with Fae magic…err, ok.  It was their second time in town (last fall opening for Marian Hill their first) and they were a kind of magic to the receptive crowd, playing most of the songs from the EP, along with several new ones. 

And though somewhat in shadow, the band mostly played under dim neon lighting of cotton candy pink and blue, with a lighted logo of their name, behind them.  Singer Lee may be somewhat petite, but her voice more than carries loudly, like Misterwives’ Mandy Lee and the Ernst brothers often swapped sides and instruments, depending on the song.  Like a darker Echosmith, and in the vein of Sylvan Esso and Marian Hill, add them to your playlist now, so you can claim you listened to them before they broke out. 

Born with the name of Sarah McLaughlin, it’s not surprising that London transplanted LA singer-songwriter goes by the stage name Bishop Briggs and the crush of the crowd could hardly wait for her hour-long headlining set, in support of her self-titled debut EP (on Island Records).   The pony-tailed artist, in black skirt and oversized Members Only-style zippered jacket hardly stood still for the entire hour, bouncing about from side to side, constantly engaging the crowd to jump along with her. 

“Welcome to the dark side”, she sang on the opening ‘Dark Side’ from the EP, with lights dialed down, a foggy haze adding to the ambiance, and three backing musicians almost lost in the dark fog at the back of the stage.  After the new ‘Pray’, track 3 on the EP, ‘The Way I Do’ lit up the crowd, who clapped along on cue for the mid-tempo of ‘Love and Fear’.

Bass often rumbled along the walls and floor, as Briggs thanked the crowd for selling out the show, two months ago, in just eight minutes.  “The thought of doing a headlining tour was this distant dream… but we’ve made it!” she exclaimed introducing ‘Dead Man’s Arms’.

Briggs didn’t say much between songs, saving her voice to soar over the simmering electronic beats, but dedicated main set closer ‘Wild Horses’ to the station’s main voice, Miles the DJ, who has championed her songs locally.  The capacity crowd called the band back out for a two-song encore, starting with the downbeat ‘Hi-Lo’, with Briggs’ voice showing Florence Welch-like range on the track. 

Made to wait, the song that topped Spotify’s US Viral chart, ‘River’, would close out the night, the crowd singing the chorus over the band, with the song’s end turning into a club-inspired barrage of beats that found the singer and crowd, jumping headlong with the beat.  

“Shut your mouth and run me like a river”, Bishop Briggs would sing and that is what she did- keep the talking to a minimum and let the power of the music be the lasting mark. And when she next returns to the area with new music, wild horses probably couldn’t keep an even bigger crowd away.