Magdalena Bay’s Mercurial World Comes to Detroit

“Yearning for a sense of real-world community in this cold, digital world? Join us in a town near you…”

This past Tuesday, on November 8th, Magdalena Bay’s Mercurial World tour came to Detroit’s very own El Club, giving fans an opportunity to experience the album live after the primary elections earlier in the evening. The tour began near the end of August, and will continue throughout the rest of 2022.

Photos: Andrew Deacon

The Mercurial World (Deluxe) album released September 23rd, 2022, which in addition to expanding upon the 2021 album, added secrets sprinkled throughout the track list from fans on their ”Secrets” hotline last year.

This idea was further present throughout the tour, where fan secrets from each city were played in between songs live, coming from this tweet below:

The concert began with Brooklyn-native pop/r&b artist BAYLI, who delivered an upbeat, bubbly set and set the tone for the rest of the night. Her positive energy was infectious, and spread throughout the crowd during her time onstage. She had a small following who had known her music before the show, but she was a new artist for most of the concertgoers and left with many more fans than when she arrived. When her time was up, she had disappeared with the crowd wanting more.

Photos: Andrew Deacon

For their first ever show in Michigan, Magdalena Bay made the stage in El Club their home. The duo, Mica Tenenbaum and Matthew Lewin, held a futuristic, feel-good, non-stop dance party for the entirety of their set. Magdalena Bay took the audience into their alternate reality for a little bit, leaving every single person a little bit more human than before they came. With a massive projector screen behind them displaying brightly colored psychedelic shapes, and the vibrant leotard worn by Mica, the entire show felt like a step into their “Mercurial World”.

This was entirely enhanced by the otherworldly Chaeri, (named after the leading single for the album), a masked face resembling a crash test dummy on acid with a robotic text-to-speech voice projected onto the screen. In between songs, the AI spoke to the band to further the themes of the show, and provide moments of comedy and brevity in between songs. These came spread throughout the setlist with the aforementioned secrets from the crowd, which Chaeri responded to appropriately.

Photos: Andrew Deacon

The show itself felt like a constant clash between futuristic synth-pop and a non-stop disco dance party at the end of time. The combination of the intricate psychedelic aesthetics and theatrics, and Magdalena Bay’s music which combines a multitude of influences and styles, led to an experience that felt otherworldly. Mica delivered an electric performance, which seemingly could have went on forever given how much energy and enthusiasm she maintained the entire night. In combination with her partner Matthew, who bounced between guitars, bass, keyboards and synth throughout the set, the duo ultimately delivered a once-in-a-lifetime performance.

Check out the Mercurial World (Deluxe), and view the full gallery from the concert below:

Photos: Andrew Deacon