The tracks Fiona Apple will always remove from her setlist: “I don’t wanna sing that song”
Spawning out of the Big Apple in the late 1990s, Fiona Apple quickly carved out a place for herself as one of the most interesting musicians in art rock. Five albums and just under three decades later, it’s a reputation that she still maintains. Between the formative sounds of her debut, 1996’s Tidal, and the near-unparalleled acclaim of her most recent offering, Fetch the Bolt Cutters, Apple has consistently reasserted herself as a stellar songwriter.
Despite her love for the art of making music, Apple rarely gives in to the pressures to tour her sonic creations. Particularly in recent years, her live appearances have been few and far between, limited to one-off festival appearances or carefully selected and short shows. Her setlists have been even more closely curated, often including a fair few covers amidst songs of her own.
There are some songs that Apple has frequented in her limited live shows, such as big hitters like ‘Paper Bag’ and ‘Shadowboxer’, but there are others that she avoids entirely. During a Q&A session, the songwriter named three songs that she doesn’t like to play live, providing reasons for each one ranging from emotional attachment to physical limitations.
‘Never Is A Promise’, the theatrical offering from her debut album, was the first album Apple admitted to avoiding in her setlist. “I’ll never glow,” she sings in the opening verse, “The way that you glow.” The instrumentation aches almost as much as her lyrics, with stirring strings and prominent pianos. It’s a beautiful track, but one that Apple struggles to sing due to its meaning.
“I don’t want to sing that because I don’t want to be back in that place,” she explained, adding that she doesn’t know how to play it anymore. It’s easy to see why Apple might avoid performing songs that were written during particularly difficult periods of her life, unwilling to allow those memories to come flooding back.
Apple’s second choice comes from her fourth record, the lengthily titled The Idler Wheel…, wich was released in 2012. She picked out ‘Jonathan’ as a song she usually exempts from setlists, again citing the meaning of the song as her reasoning. Rather than taking her back to a difficult time, however, this song reminds her of a loved one – the titular Jonathan.
Although this associated memory is much happier, Apple penned the song for Jonathan and, as a result, has restricted live performance of the track. “It’s specifically for a specific person,” she explained, and that just feels weird to do. I love Jonathan… But I don’t wanna sing that song.” It makes sense that she would prefer to keep this song sacred, between her and her subject.
Stemming from the same album, ‘Hot Knife’ was the final song Apple admitted to not wanting to perform live. This isn’t because it’s associated with a person or a memory but simply because it has “too many parts.” The track also included a vocal feature from her sister, which limits her ability to perform it to its full potential live.
Apple now seems to avoid live performance altogether — she hasn’t played a show in years — but, even if she does take to the stage again anytime soon, it seems that ‘Never Is A Promise’, ‘Jonathan’ and ‘Hot Knife’ won’t be on her setlist.
