Review: Singer-Songwriter Patty Smyth Rocks Out at Café Carlyle

This week, singer-songwriter Patty Smyth made her debut at the renowned Café Carlyle. The sold-out five-night run started on Tuesday October 20. On Wednesday, October 21, the venue was packed with Smyth’s fans. The singer made her mark as the lead vocalist of rock band Scandal and has since went on to an illustrated career as a solo artist. She brought rock-star energy big enough to power the type of thousand-seat venues she typically plays to the intimate Carlyle room, and it was magnetic. Smyth connected with everyone in the small crowd, occasionally getting off-stage to roam the audience and sing directly to individual tables. At one point, she stopped and sat in a woman’s lap, singing a whole verse to her and her very excited table.

Smyth’s song selection ran the gamut of her entire career, performing a mix of well-beloved audience favorites, like a spirited “The Warrior” that had the whole room singing along, with some of her newer songs. Amid those, she mixed in a few of her favorite classics by songwriters like Tom Waits. The show was refreshingly intimate – Smyth called out her daughter and husband in the audience before singing songs she wrote about each of them. She has a powerful voice, and was giving the performance her all. Her rapport with her band – which included long-time Scandal member Keith Mack on guitar, Rob Jost on bass, John Delly on piano, Rebecca Haviland on backup vocals and Konrad Meissner on drums – was charmingly authentic. At one point, she teased Keith for giving her “wimpy” backup vocals as revenge for her accidentally blowing past his solo part on Scandal’s “Hands Tied.” Smyth has immaculate stage presence, laughing charmingly through any small mistakes and giving the show the impression of a casual performance among friends, as if we’d all been invited for an impromptu living room salon at the singer’s home. They say a true professional is someone who manages to do incredible feats without making it look like they’re trying, and Smyth did so seamlessly. She occasionally joked about how exhausting the performance was for her, but it didn’t look exhausting at all. She was on fire all night, deftly changing tones between some of the more sentimental songs (like the one she wrote about her love for her newborn daughter) to the powerhouse anthems like “Goodbye to You.” (Smyth said she didn’t write the latter song about anyone in particular, even though everyone in her life thought it was about them. “Divorce anthems, that’s my thing,” she joked.) The show flew by, and before I knew it, Smyth announced that she’d be doing two final songs. Someone near me mouthed “that’s beautiful” as the last notes of her finale faded out. It truly was a beautiful concert, and the Carlyle’s space makes for a beautiful night with their fine dining menu allowing you to have a meal before or during the show, and the ambience of the room and its famed Ludwig Bemelmans murals lining the walls. I wasn’t familiar with Smyth’s work going in, but I left a fan.

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