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Eskimeaux<\/a>‘s show alongside\u00a0Free Cake For Every Creature, Claire Cottrill, and Lady Pills\u00a0on Thursday, May 12 was\u00a0about 50 percent\u00a0concert, 50 percent\u00a0social gathering, and 100 percent what you would expect to find in Somerville, Massachusetts. The venue itself is a site worth visiting: Its\u00a0upstairs restaurant has arcade machines and\u00a0tables you might expect to find\u00a0at your grandma’s birthday party, and its\u00a0downstairs performance venue will make you feel like you’re in your friend’s basement.<\/p>\n

True to the name of the last opener, there was free cake for everyone (with “free cake” written in icing), and people sat on the floor to eat it. The beard-to-face ratio\u00a0and Birkenstock-to-foot ratio in the audience were off the charts even for a town known as the Boston area’s hipster central. The four acts were all similar in a few ways: They consisted entirely\u00a0of or at least were fronted by women, and their visual and musical aesthetic were\u00a0a bit twee but a bit rough around the edges.<\/p>\n

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The first act to take the stage, Lady Pills, was one of the best. With lo-fi, grungy instrumentals, vocals reminiscent of The Cranberries,\u00a0and sardonic yet sweet lyrics like “everyone’s so stupid. I just want to make out with you,” the band projects an image that’s simultaneously cuddly\u00a0and sassy. Next, soloist Claire Cottrill filled the room with a softer and simpler\u00a0sound, conjuring a childlike purity in songs like “Bubble Gum” with the refrain, “I swallowed the bubble gum.”<\/p>\n

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Then, Free Cake For Every Creature brought the energy back up. Lead singer\u00a0Katie Bennett took a playful tone a bit reminiscent of The Moldy Peaches in songs like “For You,” with the lyrics: “for you, I’d write a shitty poem on the wall of a dressing room at JC Penny,”\u00a0and almost whispered her way through songs like\u00a0the sentimental “First Storm of the Summer,” which evoked the sound of raindrops on a roof.<\/p>\n

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The main act,\u00a0Eskimeaux, is the solo project of singer-songwriter and producer Gabrielle Smith. Unlike the other, more garage-like sounds in the lineup, Smith’s voice and accompanying instrumentals were crisp. Folk tunes like “I’ll Admit I’m scared”\u00a0conjured The Finches, especially since Smith’s voice is a lot like\u00a0Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs’s, but she sounded more like Mirah in higher-paced, danceable numbers\u00a0like “Broken Neck,” for which her bandmates and the audience sang along. My\u00a0only criticism of their act is that each song seemed to end a bit too soon and abruptly.<\/p>\n

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The evening’s bookends\u00a0\u2014 Lady Pills and\u00a0Eskimeaux \u2014 were the highlights, while Free Cake For Every Creature\u00a0and\u00a0Claire Cottrill were\u00a0less infectious\u00a0fillers. Across the board, though, all four acts projected a contagious excitement, perhaps because they were celebrating\u00a0the release of both Eskimeaux’s latest album Year of the Rabbit<\/em> and Free Cake for Every Creature’s Talking Quietly of Anything With You<\/em> on April 15. It felt like the crowd was not just the audience in a show but also a group of supporters sharing in a celebration, and it felt like something special\u00a0to\u00a0be one of them.<\/p>\n