Photos By Luis Ruiz
This past Friday, Lucius and Tall Tall Trees performed to a wonderfully-stuffy, sold out audience at Mercury Lounge. Gushing with gratitude, Jess Wolfe and Holly Laessig, the band’s two singers, thanked their fans for the support and played an absolutely miraculous set.
Lucius have certainly grown as a live band, which is quite the statement considering their beginnings were pretty auspicious as well. Their precesnce now, though, is representative of how much they’ve achieved since then — a confidence and energy that comes from knowing that people are more than interested in buying what you’re selling. The percussion was more boisterous and powerful, the vocals seemed to reach even new heights, and the guitar work took on a more ephemeral, confidently-gauzy quality.
With extended intros for songs like “Don’t Just Sit There”, “Turn It Around” and “How Loud Your Heart Gets”, they’ve perfected the art of flowing from song to song and really building the intensity of the audience’s reaction. Not to mention, they turned to friend Patrick Proctor to design a beautiful landscape of projections. Filled with an impressive array of colors, patterns and style, the light show complimented each song individually — big and bright when necessary and subtly changing during slower, more intimate moments.
At the root of Lucius, though, still lie the incredible melodies and harmonies, not just between front women Holly and Jess, but within the entire band. Few groups could break down a song into an acapella wail the way they do. Not to mention, few groups could garner the sort of attention that would leave the audience totally silent during those moments (last Friday was quite easily one of the quietest I’ve ever heard Mercury Lounge). 2013 will most definitely spell big things for Lucius, and playing for a sold out, tightly-packed crowd at Mercury is only the beginning.
