Pharaoh’s Daughter: For Reals

Last night’s Pharaoh’s Daughter show at the new Highline Ballroom — a partially Jewcy-endorsed record release party — made me extremely happy to be alive.  Basya Schechter is the real deal: when she’s in the room, sniveling shreds of persistent irony pretty much run for cover.  Endless categorizing of this crazy new kind of Jewish identification — hey, anyone heard of this new magazine called Heeb?  Apparently hip kids today are, like, into being Jewish!  Maybe they’ll all marry Jews and reproduce!  Look, a menorah full of dildos!  OMG, “vodka” rhymes with “latke”!  — seem ever more inconsequential and lame in the face of such deeply felt, widely-based, religiously unquantifiable, utterly solid music.  Not that it’s an either/or proposition; there’s certainly room for whatever kind of allegedly “hipster” “movement” any Jewish Telegraphic Agency reporter cares to earnestly relay.  But it comes down to this: a dozen superb musicians — from Israel, Japan, Switzerland, America, and Africa — led in Hebrew, Ladino, and Arabic song by the magnificent, Yeshiva-educated Schechter, is a triumph of substance and style.  That said, Tahl had better be sorry he stood me up.