There’s something so sublime about Faye Webster’s heart-strung, often droll soft-rock balladry. At her first show in Milwaukee, the Atlanta singer-songwriter was of few words, often wandering in and out of the spotlight – but the confessional nature of her lyricism took center stage in an eccentric performance.
Japanese indie pop artist Mei Ehara opened the show, sliding through an intimate, jazzy set as pink, purple and blue lights flooded the stage. Her backing band’s bassist yelled “we’re so glad to be here!” with a toothy smile in between songs, before kicking into another pristinely funky slew of mellow jams.
Webster took the stage wearing a brown suit jacket over a checkered button-up, placing a single red solo cup down by her pedalboard. She opened with three consecutive highlights from 2024’s Underdressed at the Symphony, launching into the dynamic piano balladry of “But Not Kiss” before the saccharine, moody lounge swing of “Wanna Quit All the Time” and “Thinking About You”. The set dressing mimicked the spick-and-span interior of a laundromat, with dryers, washers, and racks of wrinkled clothes lining the stage.
A large white tee hung from center stage, with the visual of a churning washer projected onto it before a sea of bubbles filled the air for the charming, sultry “Right Side of My Neck”, which hit the denim-clad crowd like a full-blown rager. Another setlist highlight came in the form of “A Dream With a Baseball Player”, a mellow, sun-soaked track about a teenage crush on an Atlanta Braves outfielder. Her vulnerable, sometimes campy approach to songwriting is what really sets her apart from her bedroom-pop peers, approaching subjects of passion, heartache and desire with a non-zero amount of cheek.
It’s clear that Webster has a complicated relationship with the spotlight – when it did end up finding her, her face was usually obscured by her signature brunette wolf cut. She often wandered away from center stage, instead electing to jam closer to her bandmates for the majority of her smoother, more soulful cuts. When a singular red strobe shone over her during the slow burn of “Jonny”, it felt like the show’s emotional climax – she held the mic out to the audience, who screamed back the lyric “my dog is my best friend / and he doesn’t even know what my name is” before she waltzed over to her keyboard to croon the song’s lovesick chorus.
She ended with the buzzy indie rocker “Cheers”, letting out a scream before tearing into the final riff. Unceremoniously leaving the stage, Webster and her band were egged on for an encore – she came back out with Lulu, her “best friend in the whole wide world” for a spare arrangement of the quirky “Feeling Good Today” before bringing the whole band back out for a silky smooth rendition of “Kingston”, perhaps her signature song thus far. Through the applause, she thanked the members of her band individually, before her final goodbye: “my name is Faye, thank you so much for coming!” she said with a coy smile, before walking off stage for a final time.