Caroline Rose
DC9, Washington DC, July 11, 2026
I have written about Caroline Rose before, from the
show I blundered into in 2023, but to recap: They’re a nonbinary songwriter, moving between what might be called queer club music and more indie- and rock-influenced musical and lyrical contexts. I found the 2023 show at the 9:30 Club very impressive, both musically and in terms of showpersonship, even though the music was not terrifically familiar with me.
They announced a surprise indie mini-tour and I snagged a ticket for the second of two nights at the tiny DC9 (capacity: 149, and every one of those 149 tickets was used) on a Sunday night. The prior night had sold out immediately, and I was happy to see the Sunday show; it also didn’t conflict with any World Cup matches.
Everything in this show was gleefully DIY, from the ticketing to the stage set. Rose was in a chatty mode, and told a host of stories explaining how they are trying an experimental model of touring with no third-party ticketing and self-management — keeping things low-cost and maintaining the emphasis on making music and staying connected with their fanbase. Either because of their philosophical approach, or just in a back-to-basics mood, the show initially was heavy on indie- and garage-rock influences. (Sample pre-show music? Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators and Plastic Bertrand’s “Ça Plane Pour Moi.”)
If you listen across Rose’s back catalogue, you can get a sense of their myriad influences: folk and country, white trash grungy rock, club music and disco. A lot of the earlier records like 2014’s
I Will Not Be Afraid drew from Americana and acoustic rock, before their segue into dance music. And some of what the show at DC9 featured indicated a return to rock, although more influenced by scuffed Nirvana CDs playing on car stereos in the Long Island suburbia they described with amiable and bittersweet nostalgia. “
Yip Yip Yow,” the frantic new single that just came out, is an old song that finally got formally released; its chaotic shambolic energy at time reminded me if Paul Westerberg and the Replacements had been queer girls radicalized by fighting conservative Christian school boards and crushes on Keira Knightly in “Bend it Like Beckham.” (This was a theme of the show; they talked a lot about growing up playing soccer but missing World Cup games due to touring schedules.)
It was a super fun show, even though most of the material was unfamiliar to the audiences (and, at times unfamiliar to the band; it was a bit rough at times for an artist with such stage presence). Some of this was apparently from the independently released
Year of the Slug from last year, which was apparently limited to 3000 copies and which I never heard. Other music in the first half of the set was from a forthcoming record, but Rose was selling pre-release “bootlegs” with no art, no liner notes, and an almost-but-not-quite-complete track list. There was also a lovely segue, according to the setlist from the prior night, of
The Art of Forgetting's "Everywhere I Go I Bring the Rain" into a cover of Sixpence None the Richer's "Kiss Me," which the crowd clearly adored.
In the second half of the set there were more dance-oriented songs from records like 2020’s
Superstar and 2018’s
Loner, which made Rose’s career in the world of what I called “queer club bangers.” (This is not, as far as I know it, a recognized term in music criticism.) Much as they did at the 9:30 Club a few years ago, Rose even crowdsurfed across the DC9 floor in the middle of “Jeannie Becomes a Mom,” which struck me as extremely unwise. The ceiling is so low I could have imagined them striking a light fixture or cabling. But they made it unscathed, and only were dropped once. Pretty good, Rose said after making it back to the stage. There was also the frantic crush song “Do You Think We’ll Last Forever” and the should-have-been-hit new-wavey “More of the Same,” also the disco-inflected “Feel the Way I Want,” which sounds a bit Janelle Monaé. (For a boringly straight and conventional white guy in my 50s, I listen to a lot of Janelle Monaé.) The set ended with
Year of the Slug’s “
everything in its right place” (not a Radiohead cover) and no encore; Caroline Rose doesn’t do that.
No one took a setlist for the Sunday show, but helpfully someone went through a lot of effort to
compile one for the Saturday gig. Since most of the early songs were previously unrecorded and from a new record, there is a lot of guesswork involved.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/2026 06:17AM by zwirnm.
