Hozier – Electric Factory, Philadelphia, PA 3/7/15 (SHOW REVIEW)

As if shot from a cannon, Irish musician Andrew Hozier-Byrne, now known globally as simply, Hozier, burst onto the music scene with the hit “Take Me to Church”. The viral music video of the song has over 140,000,000 views on YouTube. High profile appearances on Saturday Night Live, The Grammy Awards and Jimmy Fallon, along with an excellent self-titled debut album and sold out North American tour have cemented the artist’s arrival as a headlining powerhouse.

English singer/songwriter George Ezra was the opener and he began his set with the catchy “Cassie-O”. Nearly all of the sold out Electric Factory crowd was already stuffed into the Philadelphia venue and the audiences’ reception was loud and enthusiastic. A tale of rum and missed trains preceded the locomotive rhythm of “Budapest”, and the beautifully delivered “Barcelona” was big highlight of Ezra’s brief but bright set.

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A crewmember placed a cup of hot tea in the drink holder of the microphone stand at the center of the stage and seconds later Hozier emerged with his band in tow. Amid the uproar of the crowd, he began the set with the ultra-bluesy “Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene”. As the steaming cup of tea no doubt began to cool, the set heated up with “Jackie and Wilson” with enough driving low-end bass to make the cars in the parking lot shudder. After a few more blues fueled songs (“Someone New”, “To Be Alone” and “It Will Come Back”), Hozier brought band member Alana Henderson (cello, percussion, vocals) to the center of the stage for a moving duet of “In a Week”.

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Hozier brought the audience to the Mississippi Delta with a solo acoustic version of “Illinois Blues” by Skip James before returning to electric guitar and brought the rest of the band back for another tender tune, “Like Real People Do”. Deep end bass and powerful vocals by Hozier were a winning combination for “Arsonist’s Lullaby” that really seemed to get the crowd reved up again. The set concluded with two gospel-flavored songs, “Foreigners God” and his big hit, “Take Me to Church’ which had many in the audience as expected singing along. The four-song encore began with the popular “Cherry Wine” performed solo acoustic, before bringing the band out for “Run”, and a playful cover of Ariana Grande’s “Problem” and then finishing off the show with another crowd favorite, “Work Song”.

Hozier is a young artist with a real feel for blues music and along with a super tight band he blended rock and blues with just the right amount of gospel that were a great accompaniment to his strong song writing. The artist brought the audience a performance that combined a big show experience with the feel of an intimate engagement.

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