Before there was Lady Gaga there was Peaches. And if you ask the pseudo-trans-sexual super performer herself about Lady Gaga, Peaches will tell you, like she told The Guardian last year, people should be asking Lady Gaga about Peaches. The 45-year-old Toronto born, Berlin dwelling artist has been shocking audiences with her hypersexual stage shows and risqué lyrics since the late 1990s. On Friday, January 24, she lit up One Eyed Jacks in New Orleans’ French Quarter with one of her colorful, high-energy concerts — and not without a suitcase of new, witty costumes.
Peaches live at One Eyed Jacks on January 24. (Photo: Josh Brasted)
Although she is known for music and performance that challenge traditional sexuality “norms,” Peaches (born Merrill Beth Nisker) is a more than just a shock value popcorn entertainer; she is a consummate artist who produces all of her own music, plays multiple instruments, writes and sings her own lyrics. Her early roots are in punk and rock, always with an experimental noise edge. Her stage name, she says, is influenced equally by both Joni Mitchell and Nina Simone — reflected as well in some of her pre-Peaches folk music projects. One could say that Peaches’ brand of feminism has some staple influences, but has undoubtedly evolved into a truly unique worldview where “everyone should have everything.”
Unlike so many fabricated pop acts of today, Peaches relies on no one to conceptualize her character, music, videos or choreography — it’s all her. Many new to Peaches often compare her to Lady Gaga due to her outlandish themes, but Peaches was presenting thought-provoking performance art and blurring the lines between male and female for nearly 10 years before Lady Gaga even landed her first New York City underground rock scene gig.
With the rise of popular electronic instrumentation during the 1990s, Peaches began using drum machines and other synthesizers, eventually influencing alternative artists like Feist (her former roommate) and M.I.A. (her former costume designer) to produce their own music as well. Yet, she has also toured and collaborated with rock stars like Nine Inch Nails, Marilyn Manson, Queens of the Stone Age, Iggy Pop, Joan Jett, Bauhaus and more. Now certifiably a rock star in her own right, she created and released her own rock opera Peaches Does Herself in 2013, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in September of last year.
Since the release of her fifth LP in 2009, I Feel Cream, and the subsequent Peaches Does Herself film in 2012-2013, she has toured extensively, continuing to appeal to both original 30-something fans and 20-something crowds during the age of neon dubstep and EDM (electronic dance music) pop culture. Peaches stop in New Orleans on Friday with special guest Vice Cooler was no less packed or bouncing than any other.
Photographer Josh Brasted was there to capture some of the fanfare.
Enjoy some of his photos from the show below…
All photos courtesy Joshua Brasted. For more photos from the New Orleans music scene, check out and follow OffBeat’s Flickr stream here.
