The opening to Regina Spektor’s Live In London DVD highlights an orchestral snippet of Guns N Roses’ “November Rain” before jumping into Spektor’s own “On the Radio,” where she sings – “And on the radio/You hear November Rain/That solo’s awful long/But it’s a good refrain.” One wouldn’t expect a classical music prodigy to be a hard rock fan, but we also expect one to be such a good percussive piano player, where her ivory talents make for more a pop rock foundation than sleepy melodies.
Live in London was filmed/recorded on that last show of her UK tour in support of her latest album Far on December 4, 2009 at the Hammersmith Apollo, captures a night that in Spektor’s linear note words had “mistakes I usually don’t make and I made them in great amounts.” Needless to say those mistakes are hard to spot out here as the film shines as a strong portrayal of what happens when you put a shy woman in front of her Steinway. Or what happens when she removes herself from the piano.
On the piano side, Spektor doesn’t see herself as a sex symbol but she’s captivating in a wholesome girl turned creatively powerful, when she leads her band through her renowned catalog of favorites that include: “Eet,” “Eidelity,” “Folding Chair” and “Dance Anthem of the 80’s.” With her fondness for proper nouns, Spektor makes like a female Ben Folds, but with more dynamics, as she can turn serious subject matter though-provokingly profound on the mighty proper noun of them all during “Laughing With,” or taking a stab at country-western with “Love, You’re a Whore.”
And outside her comfort zone we see Spektor apply her limited guitar skills in lo-fi fashion during “That time.” Despite her killer piano talents, she remains eager to jump up and croon during “Silly Eye Color Generalizations” or “Hotel Song” minus any instruments. The DVD also has a few little treats like sound-check snippets, venue arrivals, and airport luggage mishaps, although the majority of the release is live footage.
One of the primary camera angles, shot up in the face of Spektor from her piano, has an almost an eerie feeling, as band leader Daniel Cho is captured over her shoulder throughout the show; he would soon later lose his life in a drowning accident this past July. It was his orchestral involvement in the majority of the live offerings that give Spektor’s anti-folk labeled artistry a cinema-graphic flair, making Live in London a worthy visual introduction or replay of Spektor’s charm and un-denying talent. The rest of the camera work, mixing and editing leaves room for improvement, but then again Live in London isn ‘t a Jonathan Demme production.
