There’s a playfulness in Kaeto’s eyes as her set whirrs into life at Revenge on Friday night.
The rising star has spent much of recent times taking her ethereal tracks to big stages across the country supporting the likes of Bleachers and HAIM, but there’s an extra potency to her sound at the intimate Brighton venue.
After opening on the unreleased ‘Words’, the singer eases into the teasing ‘Don’t Ask’. Kaeto locks eyes with some in the crowd as she rattles through the single’s self-affirming chorus.
The songwriter’s set shifts up a gear as the introduction of latest single ‘Hero’ is met with a cheer. That song, some of the star’s best work to date, spirals into a euphoric end under the club’s blue lights.
There’s a real intention to Kaeto’s live show and, speaking to CelebMix after playing, she admits that’s all very conscious. The singer stores tracks in a spreadsheet with each assigned colours, images and movements – she reveals the motif for ‘Hero’ is a dove as she even remembers the colour of the synthesiser that inspired the song.
“Listen, I love that s**t,” Kaeto jokes. “I work with a movement coach called Liv Lockwood who is amazing. My whole childhood was dancing too.
“We speak quite intensely about the songs – the weight of the song and how it moves. It’s not necessarily choreo but the movement is really thought out.”
The effect of that process in Kaeto’s performance is mesmerising. Unreleased tracks including ‘Alma’ and ‘Ceiling’ are tested in Brighton, the latter a highlight from those still in the vault.
The star’s passion for performance has even taken her as far as clown school, something she has opened up on in the past. Holding the Revenge crowd in her palm, one clowning lesson she holds close is ‘casting the net’.
“Casting the net is a mechanism for attention and focus,” Kaeto explains. “It’s a beautiful exercise when you bring everyone in.
“The whole point of clowning is there’s this relationship between you and the people in front of you. In the same way that if someone told a joke with their back to you, you wouldn’t find it funny. Connection is a pre-requisite of live shows.”
It’s clearly working as one concertgoer pleads for ‘five more’ songs as Kaeto begins penultimate number ‘No Body’, a flick that transcends into a dancefloor-filler over vocal howls.
Kaeto closes on the spiralling ‘U R Mine’. “I love singing that,” she says. “It feels so euphoric.
“It’s about body issues. I always have body issues on stage, I’m a normal human being, and I’m determined to erase that feeling in my brain.
“That song is about taking ownership back of your body. By the end of the set, I’m like my body is my body. This is what I am.”
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