Magdalena Bay members transfer their unique, ethereal and futuristic take on dance pop into a live show better than most pop artists in recent memory.
This year has been dominated by retro imitations with artists like Charli XCX and The Dare looking back to 2000s dance music, and the celebrity tabloid culture that accompanied it, crafting their albums and the all-important marketing that surrounds them. Magdalena Bay jumps years into the future and returns with the most interesting, fun and conceptually dense pop music of the decade so far.
Magdalena Bay, consisting of Mica Tenenbaum and Matthew Lewin, was formed in 2016 and had released several EPs and mixtapes before their breakout in 2021 with their first full-length album, Mercurial World. Since its release, Magdalena Bay has been tweaking the synth-pop sound for their follow up album, Imaginal Disk. The new album is more psychedelic and experimental without losing the dance elements that made it fun in a live setting.
At their show in Omaha on Sept. 12, the duo improved their recordings, making them fit into a live setting with a four-piece band perfectly. Every song from before 2022 was significantly better than the studio recordings-with songs like Killshot and The Beginning becoming more engaging with Tenenbaum’s high energy live vocals.
In a time when many musicians decided to sing over a backing track, sometimes without removing it, the live instrumentation was a breath of fresh air for listeners. Magdalena Bay’s willingness to go “off script” and include improvised sections of their songs makes for a concert experience that is so much more engaging than just hearing the song from a big speaker.
The energy throughout the whole show was infectious, with Tenenbaum prancing across the stage and the audience shouting the choruses from Imaginal Disk back at her, a testimate to their catchiness, given that the record was released only a few weeks ago.
They performed the album in its entirety with a handful of their older songs sprinkled throughout. Despite the several non-dance songs on the record the energy level never waned, as the transition between lush ballads like Love is Everywhere, and the energizing dance-pop on songs like Thats My Floor was done seamlessly.
Magdalena Bay delivered a stunning performance with the best live singing I’ve ever had the pleasure to experience, especially given the venue size. I can’t wait for them to start playing at larger venues because they have a vision for their live shows and a stage presence that cannot be contained by a small stage.