Woozy after Still Woozy

After just reaching one million monthly listeners on Spotify, Sven Gamsky, better known by his stage name Still Woozy, made his return home at Rickshaw Stop on November 9th. The Bay Area native was greeted with many familiar faces in the crowd: his parents, partner, childhood friends, and friends of parents were all tightly packed in the former TV-studio along with hundreds of fans. His homecoming was sure to be a restorative performance on his cross-nation tour.

Since leaving a math rock band two years ago, Gamsky has been focusing on creating a more personal, human sound; through a warm orchestration and overall melancholy tone, it’s easy to connect with his music. It has a sort of homey, cozy feel, which might stem from the fact that he currently produces all of his music out of his garage in Oakland. He gave us a taste of his highly anticipated upcoming EP as well, playing three on-brand, unreleased tunes.

With only five singles out, I was definitely skeptical of how he’d pull together a full concert, but he managed to put on a great show. His setlist was diverse enough to please almost anyone walking outside of the venue — his covers ranged from Hank Williams (encouraging us to square dance) to Connie Converse to Mac Demarco, and managed to intersperse some punk (of course urging the crowd to mosh) and EDM in between it all, which inspired a dance contest between him and his two bandmates. Somehow, it all mixed perfectly.

At the end of his performance, when the crowd wanted more, he came back on stage telling us, “We already did all of my songs! But how about we play Goodie Bag again?” which made for a killer encore, but not the end of the night; fifteen minutes later, Gamsky and his band danced and mingled with the crowd. First, his bandmate told me I smelled like trees. I felt obligated to reciprocate his huge smile and thanked him for the fantastic show he just put on (and for the oddly specific compliment). I unknowingly joined a dance circle with his parents’ friends who couldn’t help themselves from bragging about knowing him since he was “this tall.” I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a moment as cute as that at a concert. I ended up making my way to Still Woozy himself, and after thanking him for the show, when I planned to head out so he could spend time with friends and family, he kept the conversation going. He seemed to genuinely want feedback on the show, enough so that he was willing to scream with me over the thunderous DJ set going on in the background. I tried to ask about his upcoming EP, but at that point we were both a bit tired of belting, so we let it go and he regrouped with his loved ones. Gamsky couldn’t stop smiling as fans, friends, and family seemed to endlessly appear in his arms.

Article and Photos by Josh Hauser