The contrast between the deafening scream that greets DIY pop star Clairo’s arrival on stage, and what comes next, is telling. If the Massachusetts singer-songwriter – real name Claire Cottrill – is fazed by the adulation, then she doesn’t let it show. From its opening note, her set appears precision-engineered to avoid undue fuss – more mood exercise than vehicle for grandstanding.
The 21-year-old’s stage setup is sparse: disconnected imagery – rolling clouds, raindrops on glass, worms – flashes across a blank backdrop, and she performs the songs from her debut, Immunity (which she co-produced with former Vampire Weekend member Rostam), beneath just a bare white bulb. It’s daring, but they flourish under such scrutiny.
Given her none-more-online rise to fame – precipitated by a home-recorded video for her song Pretty Girl blowing up on YouTube to the tune of 43m views and counting – it’s perhaps no surprise that Cottrill’s fanbase skews young. With a small asteroid belt of mums and dads ringing the room, a sometimes powerful exchange of emotional understanding plays out between artist and audience.
Cottrill delivers her songs of hard-won lessons in a manner that’s self-reflective, unvarnished and serious. Her first song, Alewife, is a paean to a friendship that helped mute her suicidal thoughts. When the crowd joins in, their voices barely rise above a collective whisper: “You know you saved me from doing something to myself that night.”
From the earliest thrashings of her career, Cottrill has faced barbs that generations of women in music have had to fend off. The allegation that she’s an “industry plant” who hasn’t paid her dues might have originated on Reddit, but it’s still rock snob 101. Stratocaster cinched about her shoulders as rolling blacktop flickers from the projector, her riposte is implicit and emphatic.
Sofia, a jittery pop number on record, is recast with a rolling indie-rock gait by her nimble band, ending up sounding something like a supine Parquet Courts. Following a brief on-stage power cut, Cottrill kicks into a cathartic take on the hooky, lo-fi Bags without missing a beat. The screams start again.
At O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, 2 December. Then touring.
