Alternative R&B singer and producer Syd named her third full-length solo album Beard as a nod to growing out her “peach fuzz” mustache. The title couldn’t be more appropriate as she embraces her own standards of attractiveness and steps into a more secure, mature era as a newly sober, married queer woman, and she brought that newfound confidence to her performance at the Moore Theatre last night.
The second night of the Beard tour opened with a set from rising South Seattle R&B artist Jaymin, who had a voice like molten honey. Then Syd herself bounded onto stage in a floppy red beanie. She worked the crowd expertly, pointing to fans, dancing with the mic stand all over the stage, and making everyone in the room feel like she was singing just to them. During the track “No Looking Back,” she handed the mic to a woman in the front row, who belted into it with impressive pitch.
“Then that Jasmin 17, rub up on your body / Sensual and enticin’, you know just how I like it,” Syd sang over the lush grooves of “Jasmin 17,” an ode to her lover’s Le Labo fragrance. As I jotted notes in my writing pad, I felt like Hannah Einbinder in Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, when she dramatically scribbles “DESIRE” in her notebook and underlines it multiple times. It struck me that I’ve rarely witnessed any queer female artist, much less a Black masc one, express desire as openly and matter-of-factly as Syd—the closest I’ve seen would be Chappell Roan, who is white and has a high-femme stage persona, or MUNA, which has two white members and a femme frontwoman. It was a radical, near-spiritual experience to watch so many people of all orientations and genders responding to Syd’s raw emotion in real time. The audience swayed on their feet with hands raised, and it gave the illusion of a church congregation.
“Tonight I’m gonna swim in it, dive in it, drown in it, hide in it, babe,” she promised with all the unbridled lust and yearning of Boyz II Men during the one-minute-and-10-second-long “Drown In It” (which is about exactly what you think it is). Some fangirls dissolved into giggles and shrieks at the suggestive lyrics, filling the room with the giddy energy of a boy band concert or school dance. The song segued into “Body,” which is arguably her sultriest song and had couples wrapped around each other and making out. Let’s just say that if strap could impregnate, there’d be a lot of babies conceived after this show. Syd guided first the “ladies,” then the “fellas,” in the audience through a call-and-response for the “yeah yeah yeah yeah” choruses and jokingly ordered one man to stand up.
She led the crowd in hand claps for “Fast Car,” which is not, as the title suggests, a cover of the tragic Tracy Chapman classic, but rather a carefree, sexy number about being, ahem, knee-deep in the passenger seat—“I wanted to make something for the gay Black girls. I want them to see themselves in this and in me,” Syd said in a statement when the song was released in 2021. In the video, she and her now-wife, model Ariana Simone, drive through the desert in their Bronco and stop for some covert vehicular activity. “Take me there, I wanna ride,” she crooned, and fans joyfully sang along with every word.
Despite her self-assurance and showmanship, Syd also wasn’t afraid to show glimpses into her vulnerable side. “I really needed this today,” she confessed, explaining that she’d been sad all day. “You can’t help but wonder sometimes how much longer you’ll be able to do the thing you love.”
At another point, she explained that she started her career as a studio engineer: “It’s not the flex you think it is. I had to learn how to sing on the go.” “You did a good job!” boomed someone in response, and she laughed and thanked them. “You never know where life will take you. I attribute my success to taking the opportunities that were in front of me, whether I’m ready or not,” she said, “and I would encourage you all to do the same.”
“We love you, Syd!” a devotee screamed. “It’s nice to know you’re loved,” Syd reflected. “It’s nice when people say it out loud, in public.” Then she seamlessly launched into the song “Out Loud,” which bares her insecurities in a new relationship: “I can’t ignore it / Don’t understand / Why you haven’t told your friends / I wish you would call them / Tell them everything about me.”
Later in the set, Syd played a series of several songs by other artists for which she’s become well-known, including “YOU’RE THE ONE” by Kaytranada (on which she is featured) and “Girl” by the Internet, the alt R&B/soul band she formed with fellow Odd Future member Matt Martians in early 2011. “Shout-out to great collaborators,” she said. Toward the end of the show, she thanked her fans for their support and said “none of this would be possible” without them.
“Thank you guys for sticking around for the dream,” she said. “Who knows what I’ll be next?”
