FANCIE
Holy JoeÕs
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Sunday, February 19th, 2006


Wearing a pinstriped jacket, t-shirt and black slacks, with her fingers spastically - but precisely - pulling sounds from her guitar, and her voice stretching itself around her words, FANCIE (Elisabeth Wood) delivered one of the best shows I have seen in Toronto, and she delivered it to a nearly non-existent audience.

Her songs and her method are complex in structure, but simple in execution Ð her voice was accompanied by her guitar, and her guitar alone.  In this, she resembles an endless parade of traditionalist folk singers or indie girls.  There is, however, so much more to Wood than that.  

The sense of rhythm in her work is vastly different from what is to be found in the majority of singer-songwriter material, and in this regard, she bears some resemblance to another wildly individual artist Ð TorontoÕs own Mary Margaret OÕHara.  Wood has a way of using her entire body to sing or play the guitar, with a motion apparently working its way through her from the ground up, and only terminating in the air in front of the speakers.  Her face contorts with her vocalisations, and her hands oscillate between short, almost violent bursts of rapid motion to lovingly gentle movement over the strings.  It is rare for me to remark so extensively on the physical playing method of an artist, but Wood makes her internal state so abundantly clear through the way she physically applies herself to the music that it seems requisite to the review.

As for her lyrics Ð they are abstractions, but are made comprehensible by the way she delivers them.  Though it may be a na•ve statement on my part, it appears that there is very little ambiguity here, despite turns of phrase such as ÒI was like gold, I was still alive / Set the rabbits running on fire / In waves of rattlesnake and wireÕ. 

There is something immensely revealing in watching a musician perform to a room with practically no one in it Ð you get to see what theyÕre made of.  Will they treat the show as a waste of time and effort, or will they make it clear that no matter whether or not anyone sees, they are always dedicated to what they are doing?  IÕve been to many concerts where the former is definitely the rule, and it is tiresome to watch.  In the end, no one gains a damned thing from it.  This is what makes FANCIE such a pleasure to behold.  With a performer like Wood, who obviously benefits immensely (and IÕm not speaking of finances or publicity here) from what she does, that benefit is paid forward onto the audience, no matter its size.  ----  Chris Worden