Ben Folds may have brought the biggest show to House of Blues on Thursday night, but a rowdier one took place in a small room above the main hall. It came courtesy of the beautiful mess that is 25-year-old singer-songwriter Elle King.
King's currently riding high on one of the up-and-coming hits of summer with her bouncy ode to past lovers, "Ex's & Oh's." The song has actually been out since the beginning of the year, before she wowed crowds at March's South by Southwest, but it's started to catch on recently thanks in part to its inclusion in an HBO campaign. That's not to take anything away from King's easy appeal -- the enthused crowd of a couple hundred in the Cambridge Room came not only for the songs but for the woman herself.
The artist writes and sings rootsy pop that's both instantly likable and humorously confessional. Her soulful buzzsaw voice can seem otherworldly at times; it tended to cut through every other sound coming from King's perfectly skilled four-piece band on Thursday.
We should mention for trivia purposes that King was born Tanner Elle Schneider and that her dad is none other than Saturday Night Live alum Rob Schneider. But there's almost nothing about her or what she does that resembles his body of work (Deuce Bigalow, anyone?), even if she's perfectly adept at being funny.
The humor comes through in lyrics that are grounded in the realities of the modern dating game. King was as raw and unfiltered speaking about love's headaches at the show as she was singing about them.
After opening with the mid-tempo "Jackson," she let out a string of profanities that would impress a sailor. "Is this an all-ages show?" she then thought to ask. While it was listed as such, the crowd told her it wasn't. "Thank god," she said. That kicked off a highly entertaining format that consisted of funny and uncensored dating stories followed by the songs they inspired.
"Can't Be Loved" found her giving a one-night lover a brutal rejection. She then pulled herself out of a dumpee's misery with "Good To Be a Man." She didn't just reserve the lyrical venom for others -- both "Good For Nothin Woman" and "I Told You I Was Mean" hinted at moments of not-so-pretty self-awareness.
Armed at times with a banjo or a guitar, King let loose vocally more and more as her short headlining set approached its end, absolutely slaying on a cover of the Beatles' "Oh! Darling." When it came time in that tune to wail, she stepped away from the spotlight and did so in the darkness as the audience whistled and hollered in approval.
By the time she got to the aforementioned summer hit, "Ex's & Oh's," King didn't have to do any convincing to get the crowd to sing along. That's kind of unfortunate, too, because she'd already proven to be quite the colorful persuasive speaker.
