There is something special about seeing Jann Arden live in concert at home here in Calgary. There is so much love in the room it is palpable: the audience's love for Jann, our very own gal who has been a success; the love that Jann exudes – for her audience, her hometown, her family including her mother in the audience, for her friends; and there is the love in her music.
Arden's September 10th show at the Jubilee Auditorium featured love, love and more love. Throughout her career much has been made of how many of her songs are sad and about heartbreak and loss. Which is still about love. Yes, those songs like Insensitive and Unloved were featured in the show. However Arden has also written many great songs about being in love. Some of them like You Love Me Back from current album Everything Almost and the staple that ends the main set Good Mother are not about sadness but hope, and what our relationships bring to us.
So despite the belief by some that an evening with Jann Arden is all sadness and moping, that is far from the case. Between her sense of humor and her songs, the sold out Jubilee Auditorium was treated to more than 2 hours of Arden at her finest.
Emerging from the darkness and fog singing Counting Mercies off the new album and Wishing That, Arden welcomed Calgary to her show, following up with Sorry For Myself. This year marks 20 years since the release of Living Under June and Arden paid tribute to that album with a medley of three tracks from the album – Living Under June, Could I Be Your Girl, and Wonderdrug, as well as Will You Remember Me. The show was a mix of songs off the new album such as Hard To Be Alive and Ain't Sinking Yet along with cuts like a beautifully delivered Time For Mercy and the road song Where No One Knows Me. The show was a blend of songs for Arden fans, and surprisingly a few of her most popular staples like I Would Die For You and Sleepless did not make the set. Insensitive however was there, slowed down and enhanced with the multiple vocalists and large band supporting the song. Of course Good Mother was there as well. Two giant glowing balls with the word "Love" shone brightly during You Loved Me Back. There were covers of Carly Simon and Nina Simone and even Miley Cyrus. Commenting that you can be unsure if you like an artist but love a song, the audience initially laughed when they realized that Arden was singing Wrecking Ball...until they realized how stunning it was. Arden wrapped up the evening with You Were Never Broken, a song she wrote for Amanda Lindhout, the Calgarian who was kidnapped in Somalia who was in the audience.
Also there was Arden's humour which remains the other reason to see Jann in concert. Early in the show they invited people down to fill in some spots near the front that were empty. "Those must have been the people from Amp Radio" she quipped, referencing her recent protest of the station. She bemoaned the fact that at 53 she still had to go to Costco to stock up on tampons. "I'm not going to use it!" she complained, looking up at the sky. She bantered with multi-instrument member of the band Allison Cornell about which song they were doing, and told a story about a young Naheed Nenshi having her sign his drivers license during a chance encounter in Boston. Whether leaving the audience in stitches from laughter, or hitting them directly in the feels Arden was more than everything, almost. On this evening, she was everything.
Opener Rose Cousins was the perfect appetizer for Arden. The Halifax based singer-songwriter not only has a beautiful voice but a similar sense of humour to the headliner. "They let me ride in the bus. They have a special bunk for me, underneath with the luggage. It will be cold tonight but that is ok. I will wear socks," she deadpanned, later commenting "I've had it with your snow." While incredibly funny, she backed it up with a some beautiful songs including Stray Birds a cover of Gordon Lightfoot's If You Could Read My Mind. Jann Arden praised her later in the show, commenting "I didn't know she would sound that good!"
While Calgary may not be in love with our freak snowstorms, they are definitely in love with Jann Arden. And she loves us back.