Concert Review: Olivia Dean Brings Cool, Classic Soul to Austin, Even in the Heat
By Ricky G. | Austin, Texas
Olivia Dean brought silky, soulful sophistication to Austin's Moody Center on Friday, August 29. She played Austin City Limits Music Festival last year, but this time she came back on her own terms for her first headline arena tour, taking on one of Austin's biggest concert venues. This was βThe Art of Loving Live Tour,β which, as Olivia described it, celebrates the universal spectrum of love β romance, family, friendship, and the joy it can bring. The show explored that spectrum with warmth and lyrical honesty, which made it special that I got to experience this show with Eric by my side.
It's βSo Easy (To Fall In Love)β with her voice the second she opens her mouth. The British singer moved with the kind of ease you can't be taught. She was smooth, angelic, reminding me of Donna Summer or Diana Ross. The whole night felt silky and sultry, a mood that never broke. βA Couple Minutesβ into the show, it was clear the room wasn't going anywhere.
This was the penultimate show of her tour, but there was no sign of fatigue. If anything, she sounded better for it, every note landed clean, and you could feel her leaning into the moment, savoring where the run had taken her. There was real gratitude in how she carried the show, like she knew exactly what this stretch of dates had meant, and exactly what kind of man β or crowd β she needed to close it out right.
The tone was set before Olivia even walked out. Opener Baby Rose primed the room with a voice that's impossible to file away. It's husky, raw, and polished all at once, the kind of instrument that draws comparisons to Joan Armatrading or Nina Simone. It's the kind of voice you want to catch now, before the rest of the world catches on. The Austin crowd was locked in during her first note, which is not always the case for opening acts. Her set flowed right into Olivia's without ever losing the thread. The two voices complemented each other well, even without ever sharing a single note together.
Olivia's band deserves its own headline. The background vocalists moved and sang like the Muses from Hercules. These ladies were synced, playful, and clearly having the time of their lives, with more than a few moments to shine on their own. It's a reminder of what a live band brings that a track can't. Olivia's band brought texture to the night, breathing new life into songs we already knew by heart. Some tracks felt reinvented, not because they'd changed, but because the band gave them a fresh energy. Nothing about the setlist felt rushed either. It was clearly well-crafted, building up layer by layer, hit by hit, like βBaby Steps,β until it was loud in all the right ways.
Production-wise, Olivia kept it simple by design. No elaborate video walls, no dancers, no shifting stage architecture. It was just a warm, '70s-leaning set that put all the attention where it belonged. The minimalism wasn't a limitation either. With nothing competing for focus, her voice and her band carried the entire night, and by the last song, βThe Hardest Partβ was leaving.
Then there's the ticket saga, which has become its own genre of concert story lately. Days out, nothing online came in under $300. So the day of, I trekked out to Moody Center from Pflugerville and stood in line at the box office when it opened. Unfortunately, there were no tickets available. I figured that was that. Then, later that afternoon, a resale site turned up something in my budget, and the show was back on. It worked out, but it shouldn't be this hard just to see a show. Something's got to give on these prices.
Worth the hunt, though. Olivia Dean lived up to it.