Ed Harcourt 

The Hotel Cafe 

 
The smell of red wine permeates the air in a dim room lit by candles on this the first night of a west coast residency. An electric piano sits opposite the house piano, thankfully Ed plays almost all of his set on the old one, sometimes his power on the keys straining the strings inside.  There’s a lot of Tom Waits in the notes played, but Ed’s voice is much more in the vein of Jeff Buckley, at times it breaks a little but this adds to the intimacy of the performance.  Occasionally he switches to a shiny black acoustic, it matches his black outfit and his floppy black hair, but it complements his new boots from Texas.  He sings the song "Born In The 70's" and gets the pretty packed crowd to sing its backing lines complete with the f word. 

The song "Trap Door" stumbles in and is a thing of fractured beauty making sure everyone in the room pays attention.  At times the show is raucous especially on the couple of occasions he wildly strums a beaten up electric guitar but then his romantic side is revealed on "She Fell Into My Arms" which has Coldplay written all the way through it. 

Like Rufus Wainwright his piano playing can at times have a showtunes feel and when he sings through a echoey smokey mike, then that vaudeville flavor becomes all the more apparent.  Ed has a good rapport with his audience as he regales them with a tale of chicken shit bingo, but his devilish side pokes through when he shouts at us to clap louder to accompany a song as he has no drummer tonite.  I ultimately enjoyed the bittersweet tinges to the show and recommend anyone to check out this residency.  PS order the quesadila, best in LA.  -Glen

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