I write mostly on hotel paper

Michelle Branch's appeal lies in her 'realness'. To me she has a unique combination of raw emotion and reflection that seeps through her voice whenever she sings one of her self-penned songs. She is distinguishable from the likes of Britney and Christina not only because she is a brunette who writes her own songs and plays her own instrument, but because of the very nature of the songs she writes.

Unlike Spears' songwriter, Max Martin, whose lyrics always retain a sense of certainty, Michelle writes like an ordinary young woman. Her lyrics possess a more genuine angst, a real uncertainty about her feelings and her place in the world. It’s her uncertainty that makes her real, and her reflectiveness that makes her interesting.

Michelle Branch is one of my favourite female musicians, right up there with Tori, Fiona and Sarah, and seeing her in concert on Friday night at the Metro was fantastic. Luckily for us we managed to score prime spots in the middle of the front row, which completely made up for the wait in line before they opened the doors to the auditorium and having to put up with the annoying support act.

Michelle rocked out a fab 14 song set, whilst it was a tour to promote her new album Hotel Paper, she played the 3 singles from The Spirit Room which sent the crowd into a karaoke-equse frenzy. There were two really annoying chicks standing behind us who had the most ear-piercing screams I’ve ever heard and annoyed the crap out of me the entire time. It didn’t help that one of them got given a guitar pick either. Grrr. Anyway. I didn’t realise her keyboardist was Kevin from Spoon! I was contemplating yelling something out about that but then I decided against it because I couldn’t think of anything witty enough at the time.

Her acoustic encore was definitely the best part of the concert for me, especially since I adore the song Desperately and I like her stuff more when it’s raw and acoustic. At the end of show I managed to rip Michelle’s set list off the stage after a fight with the gaffe tape. I also managed to steal a spiffy laminated poster off the wall for my friend Evita who chickened out in doing it herself. Nice little mementos for us. Heh.

After the concert Michelle was sticking around for 30 minutes to sign stuff, but the line was way too long by the time we got out, and we couldn’t be stuffed waiting for that long. I saw a guy in the queue who we were talking to before the concert and I was going to ask him if he could get my CD signed but before I could ask him another guy in line offered to get it done for me. And no, there was no flirting or gratuitous flash of flesh involved for the favour, heh. What a nice guy ;p.

Concert overdose

I’ve seen a lot of concerts this year, with a couple more to come, and so far here is where they stand on How Much They Rocked Riss' Socks list:

1. Counting Crows @ The Enmore
2. Counting Crows @ The Horden (hell, counting crows ANYWHERE would be number one on my list as they are my favourite. Band. EVER)
3. The Bens Rock @ The Enmore
4. Jason Mraz @ Brass Monkey
5. Michelle Branch @ The Metro
6. Jason Mraz @ The Metro
7. Jimmy Eat World @ The Metro
8. David Gray @ The State Theatre
9. The Whitlams @ The Metro

Ear Candy: "Bigger Than My Body" -- John Mayer
(This new single is giving me hope that his sophmore album Heavier Things going to be just as good as Room for Squares)