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Story and photos by Matt Schwenke
Arriving at the Pabst Theatre to much hype, Matisyahu humbly took the stage in
front of a sold out and incredibly diverse crowd, occasionally peeking up to the
dark reaches of the third level from underneath his fedora. As he slowly stirred
up his brand of dancehall/roots reggae, the likes of which he crafted after
becoming devout in the Hasidic Jewish faith, "Time of Your Song" gave Matisyahu,
born Matthew Miller, ample time to find his lyrical comfort zone early on, but
awkwardly moved about on stage until loosening up later in the set.
Subdued pseudo-dance moves aside, the crowd aggressively followed Matisyahu's
every lyrical step and displayed an adept knowledge of his catalog, which often
speaks of faith and solidarity and eventually led to Matisyahu using the crowd
to fill in entire verses of song. "Chop 'Em Down," from his 2004 debut Shake Off
the Dust...Arise, helped boost the energy, with Matisyahu taking breaks to let
his talented backing band provide powerful acoustic interludes. "Fire of
Heaven/Altar of Earth" boasted bass-heavy surges with Matisyahu's infectious
phrasing and built up to the night's highest heights. Following with more from
his Grammy-nominated 2006 release Youth, "Jerusalem," which included bringing
five young kids on stage to feverishly dance about, and then "King Without a
Crown," which featured Matisyahu's verbal dexterity and later his physical
dexterity in climbing the speakers at the side of the stage and cautiously
hopping up and down to end the set, literally left
the crowd on high note. A comparatively lame encore offering of the title track
from the aforementioned album let much of the wind out of Matisyahu's sail, but not
enough to keep many in the crowd from having a bounce in their step as they left
the theatre.
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