Jenny Hval live at Soup Kitchen in Manchester review

Image: Jenny Hval

Jenny Hval is an avant-garde musician and artist from Olso, Norway. Her blend of deeply personal lyrics and unique stagecraft have earned her critical acclaim - plus festival slots at Primavera, Pitchfork and End of the Road. Following the release of her new album Blood Bitch, Alan Wragg joined her current tour at Manchester's Soup Kitchen.

Hval is having a prolific burst of creativity, releasing three albums in as many years. Her music fuses electronic and noise influences with intense lyrics that examine her politics and sense of self. 

In her owns words, her new album is about “vampires stuck in erotic self-oscillation” and “the making sense of impermanence, failure and overlooked artwork“. It leans heavily on vampiric imagery as a device to discuss the female period, combining the personal and political to startling and often uncomfortable effect.

With such weighty subject matter you could be forgiven for thinking that the performance would be a serious, po-faced affair, however the arrival of Hval alongside her accompanying performers soon put that idea to rest. Arriving on stage dressed as vampires carrying an inflatable pool, a bottle of Merlot and a bunch of bananas, they launch straight into new single 'Conceptual Romance'.

While one performer works a table filled with electronics, another gazes into various audience members' eyes whilst blindly drawing portraits. Jenny then proceeds to smear and cover up the artwork, whilst singing about “her combined failures”.

Jenny is a natural performer and between songs comfortably holds the audiences hand, drawing them in with her natural stage presence, apologising to the people at the back for not being able to see the stage.

The set consists entirely of songs from the new record, but are given new life live through the bass heavy soundsystem and on-stage theatrics. Some highlights from the performance include 'vampire' aerobics in time to 70's pornography, a pool party turning into a luminous bloodbath, and suggestive play with bananas that turns intense and nightmarish.

Yet the stage performance somehow never seems to distract from the message of the music. The spoken word 'Untamed Region' setting hairs on end and final song 'Female Vampire' delivering a huge blast of energy at the climax of the performance. 

The short set ends with calls for an encore, however it's clear that this set was conceived as a single performance, being perfectly paced in terms of energy and story. We left excited to have seen a performer who can create such personal, honest art, yet be so giving and fun onstage. 

Words @tacetmusic

Like this? Check out Jessy Lanza brings 'Oh No' to Soup Kitchen in October