Audrey Hobert’s back-to-back shows at Riviera Theatre this week have now come and gone, and in a few years those nights are going to be good memories for the few who had tickets. Because it’s the only time she will ever play at such a boutique venue in our city.
The 27-year-old singer-songwriter is enjoying a Taylor Swiftian rise. At Lollapalooza this summer, her midday set also had the Chappell Roan effect, with an unexpectedly massive crowd of fans who proudly chanted the lyrics to viral hits like “Phoebe” like it was the “Star-Spangled Banner” on the 4th of July in 1776. Like her contemporaries (which includes the likes of Gracie Abrams), Hobert has been dominating TikTok and pop culture conversation the past year with her candid confessionals that appear on the 2025 debut “Who’s the Clown?”— and there are no signs of that stopping any time soon.
She’s feeling it too. “You know when you’re coming to the end of an experience and you’re like now that it’s about to be over, I just don’t know what to do,” Hobert said on Friday, commenting on the impending end of her sold-out Staircase to Stardom tour. “It just really makes me think back on when and where I wrote these songs and what I didn’t know was going to happen. … It will be interesting when I put something out again, what kind of place in life will I be in … But I hope to see you all again next time.”
Audrey Hobert performs Friday at the Riviera Theatre, the second of two shows in Chicago.
Timothy Hiatt/For the Sun-Times
Hobert’s concert Friday night was only 50 minutes long. After all, she has only 12 solo songs to her name, and she and her four-piece band played the biggest of them — “Sue Me” — twice. Once without restriction and the second a “phone-free version” where she asked her largely Gen Z fans to put the devices away and just live in the moment. “It’s the best part of the night,” she declared, and truly it was. Her grandma, who was in the balcony and had sweetly filmed much of the night with her flash on, even obliged.
The star’s brother was in the crowd, too. Her younger brother Charlie, that is. Her other brother is the similar budding music star Malcolm Todd, who’s on his own tour. The two siblings were passing ships in Chicago this week as Todd played Salt Shed Oct. 6 and 7, with many hoping for a guest appearance or two. That didn’t happen but maybe at the Grammys, where critics are already predicting that Hobert and Todd will compete against each other as probable Best New Artist nominees.
In Hobert’s case, her Riviera show was a good signal of what’s to come. Her rabid fans have already made all 12 of her pop-rock songs into instant anthems, supported by boisterous singalongs that riled up the singer. She came off incredibly charismatic and confident for someone who’s only been doing this on her own for a year, especially given how much of a bare-bones show it was. The only “design” was a disco ball on an umbrella stand that lit up the room in a literal interpretation of “Shooting Star.” Hobert’s cousin Savannah Kirk acted as a “prop manager” for the night, helping Hobert out of her long trench coat and Groucho Marx face mask and off the chair she stood on for the weirdo admission of “I Like to Touch People” to start the show. Later, Kirk returned to dance with Hobert on “Thirst Trap” like two kids having a party in their bedroom.
It’s this minimalist, pure vibe that has made Hobert so popular and relatable to her generation who crave authenticity. Hobert’s music is an invitation into a world where every song feels like a new post on an Instagram feed. She finds source material in bowling alleys and thirst trap posts. She has rage-bait empowerment tracks like “Don’t Go Back to His A–” and strong one-on-one conversational asides in “Wet Hair.”
Two of her songs are inspired by “Friends” and “Sex and the City,” which is funny considering TV is where Hobert got her start. Before music, she wrote for the Nickelodeon sitcom “The Really Loud House,” following in the footsteps of her father, Tim, who was a writer for shows like “Scrubs” and “The Middle.” It’s also how Hobert first met Gracie Abrams as kids (her dad is, of course, TV and film scion J.J. Abrams). Years later, Hobert’s voice would emerge on songs she’s helped co-write for Abrams’ “The Secret of Us” album.
But seeing Hobert chart her own path feels like the biggest victory yet. Of all the singer-songwriters in the milieu right now, Hobert is a true bard who uniquely injects humor, ingenuity and introspection into her writing that feels like a chat with a good friend or therapist. Now she just needs another album ASAP to keep us all going.
Audrey Hobert set list for Oct. 9 show at Riviera Theatre
I Like to Touch People
Drive
Wet Hair
Don’t Go Back to His A–
Bowling Alley
Thirst Trap
Sex and the City
Shooting Star
Phoebe
Chateau
Sue Me
Silver Jubilee
Sue Me
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