“Do you believe in faeries?” reads the banner draped above the stage at the Lodge Room in Highland Park California. The same poster features drawings of horses and a large heart with the name of the headliner, Cowgirl Clue, painted on the center; Below it, in cursive writing, was her self-described genre: “Y’allternative Music.”

Before Clue took the stage, Kumo 99 and LustSickPuppy riled up the crowd with their own thirty-minute sets. Where Kumo 99’s punk-spirited electronic music drew the crowd in, LustSickPuppy’s screamo, industrial Hip-Hop tracks paralyzed them (that is, until they demanded the crowd to “mosh until the room shakes”). Their signature clown face paint, neon braids, and frequent death stares at the audience solidified them as the “Shape-Shifting Sex Canine from Outer Space” that they claim to be.

Finally, Cowgirl Clue took the stage. Her band consisted of a drummer, who tapped out Machine Girl-like breakbeats, and a guitarist who plucked riffs with the same twang-iness of a Faye Webster song. Clue, dressed in bedazzled, boot-cut jeans and a halter top, looked identical to the babysitter from a Disney Channel sitcom that you totally had a crush on in 2008. Her long, platinum blonde hair tossed around effortlessly as she started her set.

Clue began with her most popular tracks: the quick-paced, “Cherry Jubilee,” synth-poppy “Icebreaker,” and her most recent release, “Picket Fence,” a dreamy, bass-heavy banger. The highlight of her set came later when she slowed things down and even blacked out the entire room before breaking into her 2022 release, “Trailblaze☆.” Fans united in screaming the hook to this guitar-based, horse girl

anthem: “You can take the short-cut/ I can take the scenic route.” After performing more of her 2019 debut album, Icebreaker, and even some unreleased tracks, Clue closed out the show.
Though Cowgirl Clue’s set did not even break the hour mark, it certainly packed a punch. Her glitchy, celestial sound filled the Lodge Room with a sense of wonder and mystique that only a true faerie like herself can provide.

-Andrew Kirby

REVIEW: Cowgirl Clue 3/9/23