Singer-Songwriters Make Up Uneven Bill at KCRW’s Concert

The three artists who performed at KCRW-FM’s holiday concert Tuesday at the El Rey Theatre--Tara MacLean, P.J. Olsson (both of whom have albums due in 2000) and Dido--offered a primer on what’s wrong and what’s right with singer-songwriters as we make the turn into the new you-know-what.

Opener MacLean is a Canadian chanteuse with perkiness and sincerity to spare. With her full-moon face and prim soprano, MacLean could pass for Jewel’s bubbly younger sister. Her songwriting also shares Jewel penchant for tracing the sad trajectory of broken relationships in softly strummed melodies, and finding unalloyed bliss in the romances that somehow work out. She’s charming and guileless on stage, but her cloying lyrics served up a little too much chicken soup for the soul.

Olsson opted for a more vigorous approach. He has a deep husk of a voice, and he writes about love’s elusiveness in frequently allusive ways. With a full band accompanying him, Olsson drove his strident rock songs to the breaking point, even when his melodies couldn’t stand up to the strain. Olsson’s a true believer, though. Anyone who writes the lyric “God speaks your name to me in rock songs” is to be commended for sheer chutzpah.

English singer-songwriter Dido has made great strides as a live performer since her tentative performance at the Troubadour in August. Closing the show with a set of her tough-minded yet tender folk-hop, she was poised and self-assured, her hauntingly elegant voice declaiming the virtues of romantic faith over a soft cushion of ambient exotica.