My only previous live Japanese Breakfast experience was at Union Pool outside on the patio on an incredibly hot summer day. Like, hellishly hot, the kind of hot that makes everything radiate its own heat. The kind of hot that lays a blanket of sluggishness on top of everything and everyone. Don’t get me wrong, that show in the blistering sun sparked my love for JB, but I was so pleasantly surprised by the energy that Michelle Zauner brought to her performance at Warsaw.
Dressed in matching silk shorts and jacket, paired with light up sneakers, she came onstage with a huge smile followed by her band. The sold out room came alive in her presence and with the start of what I remember as “Diving Woman,” though I could be wrong (I had one job) as I, too was swept up in the privilege of being in her presence.
Her clever lyric tendencies lend to some pretty amazing singalongs in a live show: “I can’t get you off my mind, I can’t get you off in general,” the whole place croons along with her has she sways with her guitar on stage.
The hit of the night, at least in the crowd of people around me, was her cover of “Dreams” by the Cranberries. There’s nothing like a good cover of a classic song by an iconic band to get the crowd going. Zauner’s voice is so angelic and powerful at the same time, and it just works so elegantly on this song. She breathes a whole new energy into it.