January 08, 2011

Publication title: The Windsor Star, vol. -, Iss. -, pg. –
Place: Windsor
Writer: Ted Shaw

Genuine and effortless

Windsor was primed and ready for the arrival Friday of one of Canada’s international superstars, Sarah McLachlan.

Long lines of cars outside and lines of concertgoers inside Caesars Windsor began forming a good hour before the soldout 9 p.m. show.

Backstage just after 8 p.m., McLachlan was accepting a cheque from casino president Kevin Laforet for her charity, the Sarah McLachlan Foundation.

It was a gesture of goodwill from her hosts she obviously didn’t expect, and she smiled broadly. The foundation provides funding to inner-city kids in Vancouver to learn music.

McLachlan isn’t the first to sell out the Colosseum but she’s the first to receive a commemorative plaque from the casino for the achievement.

Part of the reason is her personal connection with Caesars’ entertainment director, Tim Trombley, who worked for EMI, the distributor of her records.

She’s a single, working mom with two preschoolers who travel with her. That fact, and the emotionally charged songs she writes, make her a role model for many women.

It’s a role she treats with respect, and her career has been marked with efforts to give back to those who helped her achieve stardom.

Last summer, McLachlan revived Lilith Fair, a project that has brought many young female performers to the forefront.

This tour, which followed on the heels of Lilith Fair last fall, features two up-and-comers in Butterfly Boucher and Melissa McClelland, who are members of the band. She calls her show a “mash-up” of her own songs and those of her bandmates.

The set included two each by Boucher and McClelland. Boucher’s punkish Feel Love provided a nice balance with the more dreamy McLachlan songs.

McClelland, who is married to McLachlan’s longtime guitarist Luke Doucet, sang a bass-heavy, country rocker — Passenger, featuring solos by Doucet. McClelland is also a kindred spirit in that she supports World Vision.

One of the high points of the concert was McClelland’s beautiful ballad, Break, again with a solo by Doucet.

The show opened with the first song on McLachlan’s latest album, Laws of Illusion, titled Awakenings.

The album released last year was her first in seven years, and has a more relaxed, rocky feeling than some of her earlier albums.

The country-tinged Loving You Is Easy, the first single, is an example of McLachlan’s often-overlooked ability to write great hooks. The set matched the elegance of the music, draped in shimmering, diaphanous cloth. The look was accented by three chandeliers.

The full, sonorous mix brought out the delicate nature of some of the slower songs and thundered out the rockier ones.

Highlights included several of McLachlan’s best-known songs – I Will Remember You, Adia, and Surrender.

The question-and-answer session asked her about the planet Pluto, sweating, and her favourite game as a kid.

Everything about McLachlan seems effortless. The easy grace of her songs and her lovely mezzo-soprano voice. The band was right on all the way, too.

There’s a genuineness about Sarah McLachlan that seeps through the music and the commentary between songs.

A superstar on many levels.