The last (and only?) time King Woman played in Paris was in 2018, in the basement of Espace B. Just imagine what a cosmic coincidence it took for her return to Paris – which we’d almost given up hope of – to happen just a few days after King Dude’s gig in the french capital: the perfect opportunity for some easy jokes! In the meantime, Espace B is no more (we miss its vital cultural contribution more than we do the venue itself!). King Woman has released the marvellous Celestial Blues; the years have passed, but despite her many musical projects (notably NGHTCRWLR, experimenting with breakcore, noise and industrial), Kristina Esfandiari remains a rare sight.
King Woman’s return to a French stage took place at the famous Petit Bain barge, as part of a tour celebrating the fifth anniversary of Celestial Blues. It was about time. Since the days of Espace B, the band has grown in popularity, as evidenced not only by this step up in venue status but also by a crowd of devotees – including quite a few young people – who were already gathering in front of the stage… but before the main event, the evening organised by Sanit Mils kicked off with something even rarer than King Woman.
C✩CKSTAR: THE SEX MESSIAH
Virtually impossible to find online, apart from an Instagram profile containing very little content, C✩CKSTAR: THE SEX MESSIAH is a project shrouded in mystery, a feeling that has become extremely rare in music. It’s impossible to listen to her work anywhere (at least for the moment), so a live performance is the only chance to discover this world. Behind the project is the French-born artist Lecxi Doumer, who has notably worked with… NGHTCRWLR – well, well!
Alone on stage, she kicks off her set in the dim light of Petit Bain. We weren’t quite sure what to expect, but we were met with abrasive, vicious, heavy industrial metal. The loops repeat, hypnotic. With its grimy heaviness, the music is not without a touch of gothic theatrics. One might describe the result as an apocalyptic encounter between the Genitorturers – for that raw, gut-wrenching edge – Godlfesh for their in-your-face radicalism, and Ministry for the sensation of having your head stuck in a malfunctioning engine, all whilst haunted by the spectre of Rozz Williams and the aristocratic shadows of London After Midnight. In short: it’s absolutely amazing.
The rarity didn’t stem solely from the fact that we were dealing with a completely new discovery – a project still flying under the radar – but also from the satisfaction of having come across something that packs a punch, that bites, that grabs you from the very first seconds and turns you inside out. For now, you’ll just have to take our word for it, as you won’t be able to check it out anywhere online: it’s brilliant. Whilst the underground vibe of this secret is inevitably very exciting, we still hope to be able to listen to C✩CKSTAR: THE SEX MESSIAH again one day, soon, because if we have to wait for King Woman’s next tour – and if that’s not happening for another two thousand years – it’s going to be a long wait!
KING WOMAN
Is it the band’s rarity of appearances that has generated such anticipation? Petit Bain isn’t quite full, and yet there’s a real sense of enthusiasm and excitement as people crowd together in front of the stage. Between her absence and her various projects and appearances here and there (in a short film by Boy Harsher, in the film I Saw the TV Glow, etc.), Kris Esfandiari has become something of an icon. If you haven’t been following EVERYTHING about her over the last few years, the imagery associated with Celestial Blues might still be haunting your mind: Esfandiari, her raven hair slicked back, lurking in the shadows, with a dark gaze and a sulky pout. Then, as the lights in the venue dimmed and a few blue spotlights provided just the bare minimum of illumination, the singer appeared with a huge smile and long platinum-blonde hair that, on its own, gave off more light than all of Petit Bain’s equipment put together!
We’re celebrating the fifth anniversary of Celestial Blues; the setlist is (almost) entirely devoted to it, and the ceremony kicks off with the haunting melancholy of the title track. Cathartic heaviness, soaring melodies and that distinctive deep vocal: here we are, it rocks, it's awesome, even if the frontwoman can’t stop smiling! We’d imagined her lurking in the shadows, but instead she spends the concert interacting with her audience, holding out the microphone to a crowd that knows the lyrics off by heart. King Woman plays with our nerves, holding back her impulses, until the dream-pop, grunge and shoegaze influences finally shatter during the seismic tremors and visceral eruptions of liberating, anthem-like choruses as Kris roars Ruse at us.
The mystical introspection (the lyrics of Golgotha repeated like a mantra) grows in intensity; a sort of rage swells within the darkness of the barge, a tension released by the frenzied, snarling seqence of Boghz followed by Coil – into which a few black metal shadows seep – or during the terrifying screams at the end Psychic Wound, which takes on biblical proportions. Time passes and the setlist makes a little room for the recent Bury, featured on the soundtrack to I Saw the TV Glow, as well as Utopia, a track from the debut album. Then comes Morningstar, King Woman’s ‘hit’ if one had to choose one. The musicians are well aware of this and play with the silences to ramp up the excitement a little more. Down in the pit, everyone’s sweating buckets. The biblical proportions mentioned a few lines earlier, the theatrics, the perfect mystical-poetic anthem: everything's perfect to round off the evening whilst making heart shapes with your fingers. Except that there was still the Stone Roses cover, I Wanna Be Adored, and, judging by the bouquet of flowers handed to the singer, her prayers had been answered.
We weren't born yesterday. We know that when artists come from the far away and tell us we’re the most beautiful city in the world (it’s true!), the best audience in the world (that’s true too!), the best stop on the tour and all that sort of thing, it could very well be a speech politely repeated night after night… But when we see the warm reception from a captivated audience and the huge smile on Kristina Esfandiari’s face as she leaves with her bouquet in hand, we find ourselves thinking that perhaps she really did mean it a little bit after all! And so, perhaps we won’t have to wait another decade or so to see King Woman again? That wouldn’t be a bad thing, because these are the sort of magical moments we’d love to experience again before the end of the world.
