Lauren Mayberry Lets Loose with Cult of Venus

Charlie Desjardins / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

It’s a Tuesday night in Cambridge, but Lauren Mayberry thinks it’s Monday. The crowd quickly corrects her, and she laughs. But after a small wardrobe malfunction in the form of a ripped bow, it still feels like a Monday to her. It could be worse: always the optimist, she’s just happy she’s wearing several pairs of underwear.

On February 11th, I saw Mayberry on the tour for her solo debut Vicious Creature, a deeply personal project that sounds both simpler and catchier than her past work with Scottish synth masters CHVRCHES. This time, Mayberry wisely leaves room for larger emotional wallops, and her set at The Sinclair reflected this new era masterfully. Riding a tremendous vibe of excitement, not even freezing mid-February weather could kill Mayberry’s friendly, carefree attitude.

That, and the music was phenomenal.

Before Mayberry took the stage, we were treated to a six-song set from anonymous New York electro act Cult of Venus, a fitting name for a catalogue full of alien-like club jams. Hiding under cover of dark blue and purple lighting, Venus’ appearance was just as mysterious as her music, a mixture of enrapturing synth work and tense capitalist visions.

“Hello Boston,” Cult of Venus told the crowd from her enigmatic perch. “It’s nice to be here in the age of the apocalypse.”

Cult of Venus’ lyrics have always been reflections of an anarchic activist spirit, and for her final selection, she invited the crowd into a newly-expanded arena of fear on “Algorithm,” a slice of buzzsaw glory that dominated with musings on online surveillance and effortlessly danceable darkness. As Venus slinked back into hiding, I was left wondering how Mayberry, a true-blue pop artist, would follow such a wonderfully moody primer. 

My answer came in the form of Madonna’s “Papa Don’t Preach,” which came bursting over the PA and rendered everything right in the world. 

Minutes later the shimmering Mayberry made her entrance in a sequined dress on post-disco banger “Crocodile Tears,” bringing tons of Jagger-esque swagger and wielding a cherry red telephone. The Scot wisely kept the momentum bumping on “Change Shapes” before slowing down on Vicious Creature’s only acoustic number, “Anywhere But Dancing.”

“I’ve been looking down the river of changes,” Mayberry sang with a sincerity reminiscent of Stevie Nicks on “Landslide.” The lights echoed her dress, filling the space with silver flecks that moistened every eyeball within a five-mile radius. It was a great reminder that Lauren Mayberry’s voice isn’t just a mechanism for sunshine but a legitimate heartbreaker. I hope this detour inspires her to write more acoustic tunes in the future.

Yet my favorite performances of the night were the ones that leaned into the star’s innate ability to produce catharsis. “Something in the Air” sounded absolutely huge in such a small space, and her unexpected cover of The Verve’s “Bittersweet Symphony” was hypnotic. As a diehard fan of Richard Ashcroft’s grandiose brand of ‘90s Britpop, I can confidently say that Mayberry and her two-piece backing band played the crap out of the song. It was epic and moving; a dream-pop reinvention of a near-perfect classic and a genius reinvention at that. I clapped so hard I almost dropped my phone off the balcony. 

Less than an hour later, the night was already coming to an end. After all, Vicious Creature is a concise 12-track collection.

“Looking around, I can see you’re smart,” Mayberry joked about the length of the show. “We’re near Harvard.”

She then dedicated the “final” song of the night to all the “final girls” in the crowd, launching into rip-roaring, red-lit punker “Sorry, Etc.” Mayberry may be bubbly, but she certainly knows how to throw a mic stand when the time calls for it.

Of course it wasn’t actually the last song, as Mayberry and co. quickly re-emerged to a hailstorm of cheers. She started off the two-song encore with a self-described “sad one,” an aching family ballad about changing mother-daughter dynamics called “Oh, Mother.” Once she had every mom on the ropes, Mayberry countered with the swirling, Sinéad O’Connor-infused “Sunday Best,” leaping onto a platform and bashing at a floor tom in a breathless race to the finish.

“Boston is still great!” Mayberry told the crowd before offering to come back once CHVRCHES made a new record.

I hope she does. It was an immensely refreshing show, and a great example of a newly-liberated artist flourishing under the ultraviolet shimmer of the spotlight. Lauren Mayberry may not be as vicious a creature as her album title lets on, but she’s a fascinating one, and I’m very glad she allowed us a peek into her ever-expanding pastel world.

Let’s just pray she manages to fix that bow.