Fog coiled above the stage of Benaroya Hall as the Seattle Symphony played the beginning notes of “Misty Morning,” the more than eight-minute-long witchy epic from Thunderpussy’s new album West. The band, clad in velvet, strutted on stage. Lead guitarist Whitney Petty, wearing a red disco suit with black feathers on her bell bottoms, played the opening notes on her guitar with a violin bow.
The house lights flicked on. Dancers, choreographed by Alice Gosti and Amy Lambert, sailed down the aisles, twisting and contorting themselves on the downbeats. Lead singer Molly Sides, robed in a sumptuous dress of red tulle ruffles with a black layer underneath, glided behind them carrying an electric candle. When she reached the stage, Thunderpussy, now made whole, launched into the full song, accompanied by the entire symphony.
For nearly two hours, Seattle’s all-woman rock group put on a show of abundance. Benaroya Hall on Friday night was pure stimulation. Thunderpussy broke the decorum of the symphony in a way that felt not only refreshing but necessary. When I interviewed Sides ahead of the concert, she promised an evening both classy and trashy. The band delivered on that promise.
The very notion of seeing Thunderpussy at Benaroya Hall challenged the status quo of the symphony. Because Thunderpussy rocks. Hard. Their music features bold guitars, thumping drums, and passionate vocals.
You could see the blending of the worlds—the symphonic and the rock ‘n’ roll—in attendees’ attire. People wore band T-shirts and jeans. Others wore symphony-appropriate floral dresses. Some married the looks, wearing denim over cocktail garb. The coolest 40-year-olds you know were there, their mullets loose, their tattoos on display.
During the first portion of the concert, which was music exclusively from their new album West, there were moments where I couldn’t hear the symphony at all. Then, in between the electric guitars and the beating of the drum kit, a flurry of flutes shone through and it was magic. During the softer numbers, such as the album’s eponymous track, the symphony’s effect was more prominent, buoying Sides’s soaring voice and Petty’s strummed chords. These moments were stunning. They sparkled.
Through it all, people stayed seated, cheering and politely clapping.
When a concert at Benaroya starts, the audience receives instructions: Don’t film, don’t record, keep your devices off. The message is clear: Inside the grand hall, you sit in your seat and you listen to the music. This is tasteful stuff and you will be a tasteful, perfect audience member. When the lights went down, even the most passionate fans in the front of the hall found their seats. This wasn’t a rock show, after all.
The Thunderpussy audience obeyed the hall’s rules, and those who didn’t, like the woman covertly trying to record a moment during “Firebreather” when the dancers hoisted Sides up into the air while she sang on her back, were chastised by the ushers.
Post-intermission, a switch flipped. I don’t know whether it was because Thunderpussy played all their hits during the second half, or whether people had downed enough Thunderpussy IPAs and Thunderpussy Younder Ciders to let loose, but things really started rocking during the second half.
All of Benaroya Hall stood up. People danced in the aisles. “Velvet Noose” roared into the hall. The audience screamed and cheered as Sides, now in a glittering gold dress trimmed with black feathers, sang, dancing in perfect time with the choreography. At the times when the symphony didn’t play, the violinists, older men in tuxes, grinned while they watched the band absolutely tear it up.
During their song “Thunderpussy,” Sides hopped off the stage and into the aisles. She writhed on the floor. The audience closed in around her, their phones out, filming. The ushers had no power here. Not anymore. No one intervened. The crowd’s passion was euphoric, unrestricted.
Soon, the band left the stage. The symphony took up the same haunting melody from the beginning of the show. Then, the band returned from their third (or was it fourth?) costume change, clothed in white. Sides’s ruffles were piled in layers and layers, as if she were a sexy cloud.
And, maybe that was the point. Thunderpussy closed with their song “The Cloud” off their first album, a love song between Petty and Sides. The two recently ended their 10-year relationship. Slow and yearning, the symphony’s music filled in the gaps between each gentle pluck of the guitar. The whole hall, the symphony, and the rest of the band seemed to fall away as Sides faced Petty, singing to her.
But, she wasn’t just singing to Petty. She sang to the symphony, to the rest of her band, to the audience, to Seattle. As Sides made clear during the concert, this performance wouldn’t have happened without Seattle and this show was a celebration, but also a thank you.
“Take me home, take me home,” Sides sang. “Take me home where I belong.”
Nathalie Graham
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