Staff Editor on May 13th, 2017

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PJ Harvey let England shake on Friday night and she let the Greek Theatre shake too, leading her 10-piece band through a visceral performance heavy on material from her latest album, last year’s “The Hope Six Demolition Project.” Harvey let her politically charged (but not heavy-handed) songs do the talking, as her band started the concert by marching onstage in a drum line and launching into “Chain of Keys,” “The Ministry of Defence,” “The Community of Hope” and “A Line in the Sand” — four of the nine songs performed from the new album. In the pastoral setting of the Greek, it seemed even more foreboding when, in “Community,” she sang the line “They’re gonna put a Wal-Mart Here.”

The title track from 2011’s “Let England Shake” followed, and Harvey sprinkled other nuggets from her nine-album catalog throughout the evening. Included: “The Words That Maketh Murder” and “This Glorious Land” (also from “Let England Shake”), 1993’s “50 Ft Queenie” and the Bob Dylan song she famously covered on 1993’s “Rid of Me,” “Highway 61 Revisited.”

Among the many highlights came when Harvey and her band segued from 2007’s “The Devil” to the new song “The Wheel” and its brass-heavy energy.

Setlist: Chain of Keys, The Ministry of Defence, The Community of Hope, A Line in the Sand, Let England Shake, The Words That Maketh Murder, The Glorious Land, Medicinals, When Under Ether, Dollar Dollar, The Devil, The Wheel, The Ministry of Social Affairs, 50ft Queenie, Down by the Water, To Bring You My Love, River Anacostia. Encore: Highway 61 Revisited, The Last Living Rose.

Photos by David Benjamin