At the Ritz, Chan Marshall walked onstage with one hand on her heart, an incense burning in the other, and crept into “He Turns You Down,” an abandonment anthem from her 1998 album Moon Pix. The lyrics, like so many of the words in the 47-year-old songwriter’s material, are abstract in the way they dissect loneliness and longing, but there’s no second guessing how Marshall is feeling when she delivers them on record and in front of her adoring fans.

And for 75 minutes on Friday, those fans welcomed the music of Cat Power under their skin and into their hearts during a nearly 24-song set where Marshall played some of her favorite songs by other people and so many of the vulnerable tunes that’ve made her one of indie-rock’s most beloved living, breathing open wounds.

There’s a tract of Cat Power narratives which allude to a messy period of Marshall’s career where she played erratic shows in the runup to a 2006 breakdown that landed her in Miami’s Mount Sinai Medical Center (TL;DR, she was sad and tried to use alcohol to fight that). There were no outward signs of that songwriter on Friday night.

Sure, there were moments, like on a medley the Jackson Browne/Nico song “These Days” and her own “Song To Bobby, when she nervously scrunched her dress in her hand, but Marshall, for the most part, spent the evening confidently stalking each side of the stage as she played inventive covers (Nick Cave, The Velvet Underground and even Lana Del Rey) alongside powerful runs through the stripped-back and direct cuts from her 2018 Domino Records release Wanderer. She barely spoke save for a mouthed “thank you” here and there, but a certain peacefulness (and playfulness) was parked on Marshall’s face during spiritual runs through “Wanderer” and “In Your Face,” the latter of which found her mixing in Frank Ocean’s “Bad Religion” into the tune and then asking her three-piece band for another run through the chorus where Ocean placed lyrics about how “unrequited love” and “cyanide in my styrofoam cup” brought him to his knees.

It’s those moments, despite an evening of honeyed vocals (plus a few hoots and yelps on “Manhattan”), when you remember how painful Marshall’s journey has been, and while the birth of her son has played a role in changing her outlook on life, she acknowledged that before playing “Hate” from her 2006’s The Greatest.

“I just want to say that I appreciate you coming and being a part of this world within a world,” she told fans before admitting that the old song was “a little triggering.”

In short, “Hate” is about wanting to die. It’s dark, but unfiltered, and in the hands of Marshall, who stood strong onstage at the Ritz after an impressive 24-year career, it felt like a win for the idea that it is possible to be yourself, and endure the hard times, and make it another day, week, month or year. When Marshall sings so intimately about death, it feels like a healing. In a way, hearing her songs makes you want to live forever.

Listen to a playlist of songs from the show on Spotify.

Setlist

He Turns Down
Into My Arms (Nick Cave)>Dark End of the Street (James Carr)>I Don’t Blame You>I am Stretched On Your Grave (Sinead O'Connor)
Horizon
Robbin Hood
These Days>Song To Bobby
Me Voy
In Your Face>Bad Religion (Frank Ocean)
Great Waves (Dirty Three)
Metal Heart
White Mustang (Lana Del Rey)
Cross Bones Style
Manhattan
Hate
Good Woman
The Greatest
Wanderer