Gig Review: Etta Marcus At Hoxton Hall
Etta Marcus closes her UK tour with a haunting Halloween performance that blurs the line between theatre and confession.
“Who’s ready to get spooky?” asked Etta Marcus, dressed as a sacrificial lamb surrounded by a blood-splattered band. The South Londoner, whose musical influences include Nirvana and PJ Harvey, was certainly in her element as she wrapped up her UK tour on the night before Halloween and, aptly, the night before releasing her haunting EP Devour.
Hoxton Hall is one of London’s few surviving Victorian saloon-style music halls, and was a suitably eerie setting with its creaky floorboards, velvet curtains and wrought iron balconies that gave the room an imposing sense of height. Though Marcus had no trouble filling the space as she launched straight into “Girls Are God’s Machines”, an angsty, guitar-driven rumination on the misogynistic expectations imposed upon women to “stay inside and baby-make”.
Other tracks from Marcus’s new record were equally impressive live – “Slaughterhouse” showcased her capacity for both soft and powerful vocals, while “Teenage Messiah” proved a perfect way to close the night: with its fuzzy electric guitars, lush vocals and brooding lyrics, she commanded the crowd’s attention until the very end.
Devour adds a darker, grittier dimension to Marcus’s discography, but its five tracks slotted in seamlessly with cuts from her 2024 album The Death Of Summer & Other Promises, which leaned more into dream pop – from the wistful balladry of “Skin Parade” to “Girls That Play”, a heartening ode to the women in her life. Her darkly ethereal debut single “Hide & Seek” also made the setlist, much to the delight of the loyal fans in the audience.
While the night demonstrated Marcus’s refusal to be confined to any particular genre, it also highlighted the consistency in her songwriting: raw, cinematic and confessional. Wearing her heart on her sleeve as she sang of loss, womanhood and relationships, the sacrifical lamb was a fitting costume choice: Marcus gave the night her all, and was devoured by an adoring crowd in return.