Review
Publication date : Monday, February 12th 2007 - 13 394 views
Tanya Stephens Live in Paris
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Tanya Stephens climbing the steps of the long staircase leading to the hall, like an anonymous spectator: that is a rare sight. Few artists use the official entrance in this way, preferring the discretion of the backstage. Tanya, for her part, walks through the crowd and returns greetings with her musicians while Flya finishes his opening set with Taïro. One example among others of the closeness she maintains with her audience.
 Wielding humour as a weapon of mass seduction, the dancehall diva did not miss her first encounter with the Parisian public, and gave a performance well beyond the last time we saw her, at Summerjam Festival last summer. Full of empathy, joking with the audience, she explains each of her songs, whose themes revolve around everyday human relationships, essentially romantic ones. The running order is, moreover, no accident, and lets her philosophise about relations between men and women along the lines of a scenario: meeting, break-up, and so on.
 Can't breathe earns the first pull up of the night, with a well-tuned bass and drums that led the rhythm with authority all evening. Together with the keyboard, they even made us forget the absence of a guitarist (!), filling the sonic space perfectly. The tracks follow one another, Boom Wuk, To the rescue, Take him back, Good ride, What's your story, the excellent Still a go loose (with even more pronounced pop accents), but also After you on the Drop Leaf. The show thus alternates most of the tracks from her two albums ("Gangsta Blues" in 2004 and "Rebelution" in 2006) with older titles, including Handle the ride on the lecturer Riddim, Goggle on the hip hop-tinged Cloak and dagger Riddim, and Catch me no more on the Diwalli, all played in an intro medley.
 Tanya Stephens shares the stage twice with French artists: she first introduces "my friend Maeva from Paris", whom she "just met": "She's wickeed, I don't understand what she says but it's really good," she lets out, in stitches, before Maeva demonstrates a very good flow and sensible lyrics. Towards the end of the concert it is Toma who joins her on her biggest hit, It's a pity (with its synthesised brass), delivering a fine performance in a powerful voice.
After her recent hit These Streets, Tanya leaves the stage, before coming back a few minutes later. What will she play? All her biggest tunes have already been done. She then responds to the requests of the front rows, who are shouting out song titles. First they call for 119, an old song on the Stalag Riddim from 1997, then It's a pity again. She will sing only the first words ("Say if we never get the chance to be together, go with Jah , Tanya loves you"), leaving the stage for good on that farewell.
Report written by Sébastien Jobart
Tags : Tanya Stephens (43)
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