Benjamin Booker • Kenny Segal • February 11, 2025 • Urban Lounge
Reviewed and Photographed by Sam Howard
The Urban Lounge is a very popular 21+ venue in downtown Salt Lake and has hosted shows that are both wild and intimate at the same time. Being in the heart of Salt Lake City, the Urban Lounge plays a defining role in the local music scene here in Utah and makes an exciting venue for bands and artists coming to play from out of town, like Benjamin Booker.
Benjamin Booker is an artist based in New Orleans on tour to promote his new album, Lower. Bringing a sound that hints of blues, Shoegaze, and alternative/indie vibes to the Urban Lounge. With him, he brought his opening act Kenny Segal, who is also his DJ and produces music of his own.
Kenny Segal
Opening the night, Kenny Segal put on a very chill DJ set, bringing a Lo-Fi vibe to the start of the show. Hiding behind a curtain of vibrant lighting, he performed his set to a small crowd, where not a single person could stop themselves from bouncing their head to the beat of the music. With a very bouncy, almost jazz-like sound, Kenny morphed each and every one of his songs so that the set flowed flawlessly. As the beats played on, the lights reacted with how the songs changed, giving the crowd a very visual representation of his music. With a very short set, being only 20 minutes long, Kenny Segal set a very chill and warm tone for the night, a tone that would remain for the headliner as well.
Benjamin Booker
After the opening set, the intimate crowd was ready for Benjamin Booker to take the stage. As the lights changed, indicating the start of the show, the crowd grew quiet and attentive, as if everyone was holding their breath for the first song to be played. Benjamin Booker took the stage with his DJ and Drummer and opened up his set with his song “HEAVY ON MY MIND” from his new album released earlier this year. The sound coming from the stage was very cinematic and instrumentally beautiful. There were soft guitar melodies morphing into heavy choruses. Sounds that were overwhelming, while the band played very well off of each other. The sound in the venue was mixed very well and made for an amazing performance.
As the set went on, there was very little interaction with the crowd, and there was a huge space between the stage that the crowd never filled up. It was almost as if they didn’t want to interrupt the performance. Though it made the room feel sort of empty, the crowd reassured me that they were loving Benjamin Booker through singing his lyrics and dancing to his songs. Though the vibes were very chill and warm throughout the set, the performance also brought a very heartbreaking and chilling sound at times as well, but from the very beginning to end of the show, I have never seen a drummer have more fun on stage.
After about an hour, the show was coming to an end, and for the first time of the night, Benjamin Booker addressed the crowd and thanked them for coming out. He also introduced his last couple of songs, one of them being “NEW WORLD,” another song off of his newest album. Once the night came to an end, I didn’t want to listen to anything but Benjamin Booker on the drive home. The meal of songs that was fed to the crowd that night did not satiate the hunger for more Benjamin Booker, and I would love to see him return to Salt Lake City playing at venues like Kilby Court.
