By: Diti Belhe

When I stepped into First Avenue Theater in Minneapolis on March 14 to watch Weyes Blood perform, I didn't really know what to expect. I had purchased the tickets on a whim this fall, and, while I liked her music, I discovered that night that I was a bit of a #fakefan, as I had apparently been pronouncing her name wrong (it's pronounced WISE blood, not WAYS blood). After the night was over, though, I can say that her performance blew my expectations away.

Weyes Blood is currently in the middle of her In Holy Flux tour around Europe and North America. Her opener was Vagabon, a singer-songwriter based in New York City. After much anticipation, Weyes Blood came onstage.

When she appeared bathed in blue-purple light and the glow of candelabras, I thought she resembled a ghost, or a religious vision, in her long white robe. As she started singing, she twirled and swayed around the stage, her strong voice never faltering. What really struck me was how much she looked like she was enjoying herself up there. Despite having played hundreds of shows, she was not only in command of her presence but really having fun. She was comfortable enough to not take herself too seriously, but there was passion put into every word. 

After favoring slower, acoustic numbers and some recognizable hits for the first half of the show, she proclaimed that we were going to (secular) church. The next few songs featured rave lighting, reverberating guitars and, most strikingly, a glowing light emanating from where her heart would be. While she jokingly insisted that she better see us moshing to her powerful ballad “Everyday,” the experience felt more like being stuck in a trance, with the music swallowing up everything outside of it. 

Much of the set came from her latest album, And in The Darkness, Hearts Aglow. The album talks about the loneliness and alienation that pervades our world today. As she sang about love, feeling unseen in a crowd and trying to reach out to a higher power, I felt personally seen among the vast sea of people, and I know others did too. If Weyes Blood's music is an exploration of what it means to be human, that night we were taken along on that journey with her. 

Weyes Blood is coming to several more U.S. cities this summer, so if you missed her tour this spring and want to see her live, now is a great time to get tickets.