Show Recap: Jane Remover at Music Hall of Williamsburg

Jane Remover finds magic in the brazen. Since crashing onto the scene in 2021 with “homeswitcher”—an instant hit on SoundCloud—Jane has remained a flashcube for a futuristic, unhinged style of genre cross-pollination that seemingly evolves by the minute and resists any categorization. Given their penchant for musical shapeshifting, it’s not unreasonable then, as you walk into the venue they’re playing at, to wonder what version of Jane you’ll be getting that night. Would it be the stripped-down version of Jane from venturing—a side project for which they dropped a debut album, Ghostholding, earlier this year—or the Jane on Revengeseekerz, thumping and urgent, shouting decidedly vengeful lyrics over hectic trap beats? Shapeshifting is what they do best: They’ve even said it themselves and tonight, they’ve chosen to morph into someone unabashedly raw.

Jane’s third album has snowballed into something of an online phenomenon. Musically, Revengeseekerz fuses Jane’s particular brand of jagged, glitched-out EDM with impassioned, self-referential lyrics slathered in partying, love, and retributory violence. It’s a brilliantly deranged record that typifies Jane’s ability to marry unfiltered rage to a heavy dose of playful wit.

And live, it’s great. It’s an unexpected spectacle: The stage setup is minimal, something conducive to a rap cypher, just a mic and a DJ (Dazegxd, whose brilliant opening set transitioned seamlessly into Jane’s). With no instruments and just a row of vertical LEDs, they are largely left to their own devices, but the performance is pummeling. Hands in the air, Jane skirts up and down the stage with reckless abandon, tearing through a 14-song set, roaring lyrics with impish delight in performances of “TWICE REMOVED,” “JRJRJR,” “Dancing with your eyes closed,” and “Professional Vengeance.”

And the crowd is a monolith, harsh and unyielding, thrashing left and right in unison, opening up the pit again and again just to slam it back closed. It feels as if a riot is about to break out during “Dancing with your eyes closed”; Jane even jokes about being inadvertently dragged into the pit. They stop for a few moments of lightheartedness, taking artwork from fans and addressing the crowd, then it’s back to setting the venue alight, revelers vaulting around with phone cameras out, bellowing lawless lyrics over thunderous, wall-shaking basslines.

The chaos is fitting: Revengeseekerz itself is all over the place, with elements of hip-hop, drill ‘n’ bass, punk, and shoegaze all thrown together over a breakneck beat. For an artist so often reduced to the (arguably pejorative) “internet music” category—which doesn’t always so easily translate to concert fare—Jane Remover’s show is a tangible ball of energy, an exuberant, unyielding smash-n-grab that flings you in all manners of directions. It’s self-redeeming, deliciously delirious, and takes the title of their tour (and the song) to heart: TURN UP OR DIE.

Check out our photos from Jane Remover’s Music Hall of Williamsburg show, captured by Valerie Magan below.