Regina Spektor
The Russian-born songstress is touring in support of Remember Us to Life, with a retrospective road show that features her sitting at the piano and telling stories from throughout her life and career, which of late has been positively resurgent. Aside from being heard on the hit Hamilton Mixtape, she’s been turning up on the soundtrack of Orange Is the New Black and just recently recorded still-unheard collaborations with Odesza and Gogol Bordello.
It’s probably unfair to burden her with expectation-laden mantles like “our generation’s Joni Mitchell” (which, coming from Esquire magazine, failed to narrow down exactly which post-‘60s generation Spektor belongs to), but Remember Us to Life is a revelatory listen, full of insights into her experiences as a young Russian-speaking immigrant in New York City. It’s the kind of conversational folk pop that also, sometimes sneakily, proffers a message beneath the music, albeit one you can tap your toes along to.