During her show in Columbia, Maryland, on Tuesday night, Jill Sobule insisted she was not a one-hit wonder. She then launched into what she described as a medley of her two hits. Whether “Supermodel” qualifies as a hit is debatable. Australia is the only place where it charted. But it remains a dynamite song that helps cement Sobule as one of the pioneering women of pop punk in the mid-‘90s.
The second part of the “medley” (it wasn’t a medley – she just played both songs straight through) is a certifiable sensation. “I Kissed a Girl” is so much wiser and wittier than the Katy Perry song of the same name that came out 13 years later, so they really shouldn’t be compared. But they will be, and Sobule now seems copacetic about the whole thing.
“I Kissed a Girl” helped establish Sobule as a gay icon back in the ‘90s, and she retains that status today, especially in the wake of her recent musical F*ck7thGrade, an autobiographical journey of what it's like to come of age and then navigate adulthood without the advantages of traditional heterosexuality.
Jill Sobule: Just as we need her
Sobule played a couple of selections from the musical, including “Raleigh Blue Chopper,”- equal parts rocking and poignant - about that time just before girls hit adolescence and their place in the world changes.
Shortly after, she sang “I Put My Headphones On,” from her last formal studio release, 2018’s Nostalgia Kills. Another gorgeous song that pays homage to the music of her youth, namedropping everyone from Janis Ian to Lou Reed. On songs like “Headphones” and “Raleigh Blue Chopper,” Sobule shows off her outstanding songwriting skills, balancing optimism and defeat, catchy melodies barely masking things that have been tragically lost.
The historical timing of this particular show, in a town just a few miles outside of Washington, DC, carries specific weight. And so it was that the other side of Sobule’s persona – the feisty, irreverent agitator – came to the fore more often than not.
Opening her performance from the middle of the intimate cabaret at the Collective Encore, Sobule strolled among tables of fans, strumming her guitar and singing “Resistance Song,” the original B-side of “I Kissed a Girl,” promising to “Hide in the bushes, shoot from the bushes, make love in the bushes, like there was no tomorrow.” Almost everyone in attendance sang along.
She stayed in the crowd for 2017’s “America Back,” chronicling all the immigrants who made the USA their home, not merely the most recent ones. Again, the crowd enthusiastically joined in on the chorus – “When they say ‘we want out America back’ – Well what the f**k do they mean?”
Then she took the stage, traded in her full-sized acoustic guitar for her signature Vagabond mini and played – as she is prone to do – a brand new song that isn’t even finished. Using an iPad to keep the new lyrics straight, she announced, “This isn’t my best, but it gets to the point.”
She sang “J.D. Vance is a …” Well, I can’t say it in this forum. Just know that the song offered an impressive array of rhymes, one of which was the actress “Emily Blunt.”
She followed it with an even more inchoate political statement – “Bring Back Richard Nixon.”
Sobule continued playing songs old and new—some old favorites like “Karen By Night,” “Mexican Wrestler,” and the triumphant “Underdog Victorious” as an encore. Others were so new they don’t have names—at least no names that I know. They were all worth listening to.
Robbie Schaeffer, guitarist with Eddie From Ohio, opened the show with a strong set of originals and a couple of covers of Paul Simon and Lyle Lovett. Schaeffer, recently ordained as a rabbi, requested ten seconds of silence after finishing Lovett’s sweet “If I Had a Boat.” The effect was fairly remarkable. Later, Sobule would recall him to the stage to sing an impromptu “Sunrise Sunset” from Fiddler on the Roof.
You never really know what you might get at a Jill Sobule show. She and her Vagabond mini set out on the road this week to support The Fixx up and down the East Coast for the rest of April. At one point, she wondered out loud if her idiosyncratic brand of political pop theater would play to a Fixx crowd. I can state with absolute conviction that I have no idea.
But it will certainly be fun to see.