Sea Of Bees
The Wilmington Arms, London
24/02/2011

Tonight the burrow-like back room of The Wilmington Arms plays host to a low-key performance from solo-artist Sea Of Bees. Née Julie Ann Baenziger, the Sacramento resident has recently been reaping critical attention for her first album, ‘Songs For The Ravens’ – a wistful, meditative ode to hearts broken, loves lost and the simultaneous joy and pain felt throughout relationships. Despite comparisons to Joanna Newsom and Cat Power, criticisms of melodic mediocrity and misplaced potential have peppered analyses, the more contrary reviewer lamenting a lack of fixed direction from the 25 year old’s début. These blinkered judgements take precedence at the expense of the album and the artist’s pulse – emotional flux, in its most candid form.

This raw, unflinching honesty is at the heart of tonight’s performance. Huddled on the tiny stage, blinking into the overhead lights, Baenziger is joined only by her acoustic guitar, and tour mate Amber Padget – a sparsity which tantalisingly hints at the performance to follow. The intricately woven ripples and swells of manifold instruments palpable on record have been dispensed with, in their place arresting, simple guitar work layered under wrenchingly moving vocals. Tracks ‘Gnomes’ and ‘Blind’ cast a deathly hush over the audience, Baenziger’s syrupy slur rolling through her lower range before tripping into childlike, impassioned calls; the delicate control of her upper register acutely pinpointing her natural talent. ‘Sidepain’ reveals itself to be a surprise stand-out track of the night – the album doing its sweet somnolence little justice.

Thematically, this evening’s performance shifts between polarities: Baenziger’s betwixt song chatter veers deliciously from unyielding candour to impeccably-timed humour, the room hanging on her every breath – yet at other moments, the singer becomes so adrift in her own harmonic adventures, she seems surprised to find herself in company at the close, her eyes flickering gently open. This disarming fidelity to self is just what makes Sea Of Bees so engaging a performer: technical difficulties litter the set, but with a quip and a smile, Baenziger side-steps any awkward stalls by launching into a new yarn, revealing another chink through which we share the myriad colours of her imagination. 

Annette Barlow