More clarion in person than in her studio recordings, her voice is high but not airy. Though many other things about this show do not stand out, White’s voice does. Yet, she is also endearing in the way she can laugh at the more middling aspects of her performance like when she forgets the words so obviously that she asks after the song is over, “You seen me f- up?”
She does it some but not all of the time. I am reminded at her show of the particular struggle of trying to hold a room’s attention continuously for two hours. It feels as if she is strolling through the concert unconcerned, phoning it in. She is totally comfortable on stage, swaggering around in her outlandish costume, smiling at people. When the plodding bass of “Unstoppable” starts to play with its easy chorus, they readily sing along, already knowing the words. The crowd is ready to be won over by White. Her dancers wear old fashioned cheerleading outfits and retro futuristic black and green neon visors that gleam preternaturally under the black light. Seuss-style pompoms on poles stuck in the corners. The stage they’re on looks like a half-hearted attempt at a retro beachside cabana with palm fronds and huge fluffy Dr. Onstage, White has her two backup dancers with her: women that have toured alongside her so often that they are fixtures of the Santigold aesthetic itself. Like most things connected to Santi White, it is somewhere in between. It is not the bumping and grinding and twerking of hip hop nor is it the moshing and rollicking bodies of rock. People wave their bodies like sheaves of wheat in the breeze and pulse their heads back and forth. The dancing at a Santigold concert is not normal dancing.