It was a sunny but brisk Tuesday evening in the Lower East Side. Stepping into Night Club 101, I was immediately enveloped with the earthy smell of incense – frankincense and myrrh. I sat at the bar and ordered a cider. All of a sudden, randomly at the beginning of April, I was experiencing an autumn evening. However, the show that was about to transpire would transcend season and even time. As fans began to crowd into the concert hall itself, an intimate room that couldn’t have been more than a few hundred square feet, the energy shifted. It could have been the 80s, all of us gathered in one of those underground NYC music clubs that my dad tells me he used to frequent when he was my age, if it weren’t for all the iPhones that went up the moment the lights lowered.
Avery Cochrane’s band took the stage as the opening chords of her recent hit, ‘Griever,’ filled the room. They were dressed in suits and dress shirts, artfully left unbuttoned, with lipstick smeared on their face – a nod to her most recent music video. Fans were shoulder-to-shoulder, watching the stage in anticipation. Avery’s voice singing the opening line rang out through the speakers, but she was still nowhere to be seen. Instinctively, I believe, we all began to look around the room in confusion. Very quickly, all of our eyes found a figure being led through the crowd by a bright flashlight, cloaked in a long black coat and dark sunglasses. Entering her show as the Griever herself, Avery Cochrane maneuvered through the crowd and took the stage. As the song’s first chorus hit, she tore off her coat and glasses to reveal a shimmering, ABBA-esque silver jumpsuit. Thousands of sequins and oversized payettes caught the light, painting the room in a kaleidoscope of light.
This was just a taste of the high-concept, high-connection show that Avery has built and presented to her fans along this mini-tour of EP release shows. Whether through mid-song banter or intimate storytelling, her lengthy introductions to each track served as a bridge, bringing the crowd deeper into her world. Once she started ‘Loneliness in Numbers,’ my personal favorite song from her newest EP, my camera went down. I couldn’t help it, I just wanted to be part of the moment with everyone else in the room. The rest of the set was a meticulously planned performance. Avery is ahead of her years in terms of concept and worldbuilding, and it was extremely exciting to watch such a small artist in such a small venue put on a show worthy of an arena. As she matures even further in her craft, I have no doubt she’ll end up a huge popstar, ala Sabrina Carpenter or Chappell Roan.
Avery winked at the crowd before announcing that she would be playing her last song, the title track off of her new EP. Everyone knew not to go anywhere afterwards – she still hadn’t played her biggest, and viral, hit, ‘Shapeshifting on a Saturday Night.’ Its success on social media allowed Cochrane to quit her restaurant job and move to LA to pursue music full-time, thus resulting in the release of this new EP. She left the stage quickly, and the lights rose momentarily. No one budged. Moments later, Avery’s voice rang out through the speakers once more, though she was, yet again, nowhere to be found.
“Guys, I don’t have time to sing Shapeshifting. I have to go! I have a busy night…”
Everyone laughed. She came back out onto the stage, in a light gray trench coat with her purse on her shoulder, face shielded with huge sunglasses. Toying with the crowd, she argued that she wouldn’t have time to play her big hit, and then allowed them to ‘convince’ her. She tore off her coat and glasses once more, revealing yet another shimmering outfit, this time a short mini-dress lined with sequined fringe. The crowd was completely on board with the experience, echoing every word back to her, with someone in the front row even handing her their martini glass as a prop – a nod to her music video for the song. She thanked fans profusely for coming before leaving the stage once more, this time for real.
Avery Cochrane’s newest EP, “Male Validation and Other Drugs,” is incredibly complex in terms of both songwriting and production. It gives the impression of a project that you would expect from an artist much later in their career, so it’s impressive that this is only the teaser to her rumored upcoming debut album.
Before playing an unreleased track that may appear on said album in the future, she told us,
“I hope it comes out this year! It might not come out this year, but it might! I hope it does!”
And I do too. You can keep up with Avery on social media to see where she goes next, and stream her new EP ‘Male Validation and Other Drugs’ on all streaming platforms. For the full photo gallery from the show, click HERE.