St. Vincent and Arooj Aftab
Detroit Opera House
1526 Broadway St.
Detroit
Friday, July 24
It’s rare for an opener to upstage the headliner, especially when the main act is backed by an entire orchestra.
That’s what unfolded, however, when St. Vincent performed at the Detroit Opera House with opening support from Pakistani singer-songwriter Arooj Aftab.
With just her voice and guitarist Will Graefe, Aftab quietly enraptured the audience with her otherworldly voice. I can’t think of another time when a gentle opening act like this managed to shut up the droves of people walking in and attempting to find their seats. Normally, the opening act gets washed away in the chaos of folks settling in. In this case, patrons heard just a bit of Aftab’s voice walking in and quickly understood the assignment — shut the fuck up and listen.
Singing in both her native language of Urdu and English, there’s something magical and transfixing in Aftab’s delivery. It’s slow and deliberate, each syllable getting treated with the utmost respect. Her guitarist was no doubt her secret weapon, adding enough illustration and percussive elements through his strumming (alongside plenty of reverb and loops) as a sort of musical bed for her voice to lay.
Songs like “Whiskey,” from her 2024 album Night Reign, and her 2021 breakout single “Mohabbat” absolutely filled the Detroit Opera House, reaching all the way to the back of the room and showing off the stunning acoustics of the venue.
Which made it a bit shocking that St. Vincent didn’t fill out the room in the same way, even with the Detroit Opera Orchestra backing her.
After seeing operas and dance productions on this same stage and hearing the acoustics of the place, it was odd to watch and listen to St. Vincent on stage with full orchestration and feel that she was so, so far away, like she was performing in a separate room entirely and I was straining my ears to hear what she was playing.
Gone were the angular guitar hooks and aggressive stage presence that the art rock act is known for when she performs her non-orchestral shows.
Here, it was all rounded edges and painfully smooth transitions, where style and presentation far outweighed the music itself (including an awkward, stiff model who would switch out St. Vincent’s guitars, dressed like some sort of rock ’n’ roll flight attendant). Sonically, it was a step back from her Live In London! album, where she performs booming, cinematic arrangements of songs like “Hell Is Near” and “Reckless” with the Jules Buckley Orchestra.
The Detroit performance simply didn’t have the same punch as that recording, although diehard fans of hers in the crowd didn’t seem to mind at all.
It would be completely false to say this was a bad performance by St. Vincent, but it is fair to say that it was underwhelming — especially after seeing her live several times before and hoping the same thunder and swagger would hit extra hard with the orchestra.
Instead, it showed us another side of St. Vincent — a more proper, smoother entity that’s way less engaging.
And it didn’t help matters that Arooj Aftab may be one of the hardest acts to follow in the game.
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