Madi Diaz @ Off Broadway | 03.07.24
Sad girl troubador Madi Diaz brought her Weird Faith tour to Off Broadway in St. Louis, Missouri on March 7th, 2024 in support of her excellent new album of the same name.
Like I had said in my Otoboke Beaver piece for The Arts STL, March and April can be a pretty exciting time for live music in St. Louis due to indie artists trying to hit as many cities as possible around SXSW and festivals like Coachella. Madi Diaz can be chalked up as another one of those visiting artists who may have not stopped in Mound City were it not for the big industry brouhaha in Austin.
Madi Diaz has been releasing music since 2008, and though she has some very impressive accomplishments in her career, they haven’t exactly made her a household name, though that might be changing. She was tapped in early 2023 to open a series of shows for the pop star Harry Styles and later joined his band for the European leg of his On Love tour. Her new record, Weird Faith, has gathered quite a bit of critical acclaim. She’s been on Jimmy Kimmel and Good Morning America, and has been featured in Rolling Stone and the 3 other remaining big music sites that are worth reading. On this tour, she’s played to some rather packed rooms in places like New York City and Chicago. It most certainly seems like something is happening for Madi.
While Off Broadway is not the biggest room on the Weird Love tour, it is not lacking in charm or atmosphere. Formerly a utility building for the Lemp Brewery, which still stands across the street, it is a surprisingly warm and inviting space. A new stage was put in two years ago, and the outdoor patio space is a great spot to catch up with old friends and to make new ones. This small venue can be many things, and tonight it is an intimate affair.
Welding an old Harmony hollowbody guitar, Madi Diaz chuckles as she fixes her mic stage. She is joined on drums and synth by Adam Popick. Standing on a small, round shag rug, Diaz is met with a modest crowd, but one that contains a notable segment of young fans that are obviously very excited to see her perform. St. Louis can be a city that can put a touring musician’s ego in check, but the duo doesn’t seem to mind that they’re not playing in a shoulder to shoulder room. In fact, they seem to be in pretty good spirits, no doubt helped by what looks to be a successful tour.
The first time I listened to Madi’s music, I had to turn it off after a handful of songs. Not all at because it was bad or boring, but because I was at work and was getting dangerously close to have an emotional moment. I wasn’t expecting lyrics so sharp and expressive, so full of heartache and the painful parts of the human experience. I also did not expect to be faced with something that reflected my own experiences, that tear-in-your-beer pathos knowing you’ve been the person singing in some songs and the villian being sung about in others. Being called out one moment, and feeling seen the next. It’s something powerful and rare that resonates deep, even if you haven’t lived the comically garbage life that I have.
It is my understanding that it has been about 10 years since Madi last played St. Louis, and there seemed to be more than a few folks in the crowd that were very happy to have her return. While I may not yet share the exact same affection for Diaz, I respected their excitement and the energy they helped bring into the room. About mid set, between songs, a young lady raised her cell phone in the air with the screen facing Diaz, who squinted and asked, “Serving cunt? Is that good?” She paused. “Is singing a song about my father serving cunt?”
In my many years of documenting live music, this was one of the most unexpectedly humorous things I’ve witnessed. It did indeed get a reaction as Diaz seemed baffled by the statement. While I have a hard time believing she was unfamiliar with the phrase, that seemed to be the case. I do apologize for not asking the young lady if Diaz was giving mother or if she ate.
Diaz comes off as a very introspective individual, but also well humored. There were little moments of lightheartedness with the crowd, like the one previously mentioned, that balanced out the heavier moments. In particular, Madi told us a story about going through an insanely rough break up while trying to get through security at Lambert Airport here in St. Louis years ago wherein she explained in great detail just how much our troubadour was a hopeless wreck. Unexpectedly, this sorrowful story ended with a very dry, but very sweet punchline. I do not think I could do it justice to paraphrase what she said, so I didn’t even try. You’ll just have to imagine it. Or hassle her to tell the story on social media. It’s a free country.
It may have not been a crazy sold-out show but it will be one that I know that myself and the other folks that attended will be thinking about for a while. It is one thing to go to a show and be entertained, it is another to feel like you were present for something special and rare. I hope the future holds quite a bit of success for Madi Daiz in her journey.
Check out the rest of my photos from Madi Daiz’s performance at Off Broadway here.
The Shoot
This was a standard low light affair at Off Broadway. The lighting here can be a little tough, but this is still one of my favorite rooms in St. Louis. There were a half dozen or so bare light purple bulbs on stands that added some interesting dynamics to the light on stage. I was comfortable just using my Fujifilm X-T5 with the Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8 DC DN Contemporary lens in this situation. It’s a light kit that’s very flexible that allows me to move around quietly and not be a distraction at shows like this. I am very happy with these photos. It can be very tough to photograph two performing musicians in a situation like this, and I won’t say that it was easy, but there was just enough challenge to make me focus and work to get the shot without feeling like I was trying to fill a well with snow. Madi Diaz and Adam Popick are, thankfully, not stiff or uninteresting performers to photograph, which not always the case for shows like this.
I felt like most of my files popped better in black and white. Though, I did use a Fuji Superia 800 VSCOFILM filter (yes, I still use those from time to time) before converting to monochrome, which gave the images a slight green/blue tint that I really enjoy.