Feist: Tiny Desk Concert

Stephen Thompson | July 24, 2024
There’s always been a disconnect between Leslie Feist’s music — soothing, thoughtful, deliberately crafted — and her warm, wryly funny personality. We got to witness both in her long-awaited Tiny Desk debut, which finds her showcasing new and old material amid self-effacing commentary on the pandemic, public speaking and her strange moment of reality-TV fame.

“The great joke that will always remain about [her song ‘Hiding Out in the Open’] is that we ended up singing it to contestants on The Bachelor — where true love rules all, of course,” Feist said between songs. “So singing truisms about eternal love to youth on a game show changed the context forever.”

Performing two songs from last year’s wonderful Multitudes (“In Lightning” and “Hiding Out in the Open”) and two songs from 2011’s Metals (“Caught a Long Wind” and “The Bad in Each Other”), Feist was joined by a group of players and singers who’ve each performed notable work in their own right: Keyboardist Rose Droll is a terrific solo singer-songwriter, drummer Andrew Barr plays in The Slip and The Barr Brothers, bassist Todd Dahlhoff often plays and records with Devendra Banhart and Meshell Ndegeocello, and multi-instrumentalist Amir Yaghmai is a member of The Voidz. Together, though, they sound like one impeccable organism, with Feist herself as its bold, unfailingly kind beating heart.

SET LIST
“In Lightning”
“Caught a Long Wind”
“Hiding Out in the Open”
“The Bad in Each Other”

MUSICIANS
Leslie Feist: lead vocals, guitar
Amir Yaghmai: violin, guitar, vocals
Todd Dahlhoff: bass, vocals, musical direction
Andrew Barr: drums
Rose Droll: keys, piano, vocals

TINY DESK TEAM
Producer: Stephen Thompson
Director: Joshua Bryant
Audio Technical Director: Neil Tevault
Editor: Kara Frame
Host/Series Producer: Bobby Carter
Videographers: Joshua Bryant, Kara Frame, Zayrha Rodriguez
Audio Engineer: Hannah Gluvna
Production Assistant: Ashley Pointer
Photographer: Michael Zamora
Tiny Desk Team: Hazel Cills, Maia Stern
Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
Series Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson
VP, Visuals and Music: Keith Jenkins