Staff Editor on February 3rd, 2020

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There were plenty of thrills — and one notable spill — when Caroline Polachek headlined the Fonda Theatre on Saturday night.

Polachek, formerly one-half of the pop duo Chairlift, was touring in support of last fall’s album “Pang,” her first release under her own name (after having made music as Ramona Lisa and CEP). The crowd at the sold-out Fonda showered her with adulation as she opened the show with the first two songs from the new album, “The Gate,” and the title track. She appeared overcome with emotion by the warm welcome.

With her voice soaring, she prowled the stage for “Hit Me Where It Hurts” and “New Normal,” then went acoustic for “Look at Me Now.” Two songs later, during “Ocean of Tears,” she came to the front of the stage … and tumbled off, into the pit. As fans murmured their concern, she sat stunned for a second. Then she clambered back onstage and continued.

“I can’t believe I fell off the stage,” Polachek said a couple of songs later. “I keep thinking about it as I sing and almost start laughing. In light of that, this is a cover.”

She then played the Corrs’ “Breathless,” followed by “No Angel,” a song she co-wrote with Beyoncé for the latter’s self-titled album. (She also covered Charlie XCX’s “Tears”).

(“L.A., I fell hard for you last night,” she joked on Twitter on Sunday, adding that she would see everyone at her 5 p.m. appearance Monday at Amoeba.)

Near the finish, she told a story about the song “Parachute,” one she described as being about trust and giving up control. It’s based on a dream in which she “decided that jumping out of the plane was a better idea than staying in it.

“I jumped out the open door of this plane and I’m plummeting, freewheeling over Los Angeles and as I’m getting closer to the ground I realize, ‘OK, I’m gonna die. This is it, this is death, but at least that’s better than whatever’s happening up there.’ So as I’m getting closer, suddenly I feel a parachute pull me up. I was attached to it the whole time. And I realize I’m going to survive. And this wave of relief washes over me, and I realize, ‘Oh my God, I didn’t realize that this kind of salvation existed. That I was gonna make it. This is amazing.’

“I start getting closer to the ground and the wind picks up and it starts dragging me out, far out of the water. And once again I realize I’m gonna die. Because the parachute’s gonna fall on top of me and drown me. So this is just, like, death but [a] delayed version. So I start once again making peace with the fact that I’m going to die. And it’s a much slower approach. I’m watching the water get closer and sparkle, seagulls are flying under me. And I decide, ‘Well, if I’m gonna die, this is probably the most beautiful way it could happen.’ And just at the last moment when I’m kind of preparing myself to kind of hold my breath and go under, the parachute pulls me up again, and I’m now drifting over north Los Angeles, like, towards the suburbs. And I get dropped very slow and gently next to a parking lot of a strip mall. And it’s the most beautiful concrete and grass I have ever seen. And, um… and I survived.

“And [the song is] about, you never know honestly how you get the ways in which you’re gonna survive. It’s not really up to us.”

Setlist: The Gate, Pang, New Normal, Hit Me Where It Hurts, I Give Up, Look at Me Now, Insomnia, Ocean of Tears, Hey Big Eyes, Breathless (The Corrs cover), No Angel (Beyoncé), Tears (Charli XCX cover), Go as a Dream, Caroline Shut Up, So Hot You’re Hurting My Feelings, Parachute, Door.

Photos by Dana Lynn Pleasant