{"id":74827,"date":"2025-11-29T19:58:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-29T19:58:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/74827\/"},"modified":"2025-11-29T19:58:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-29T19:58:11","slug":"sarah-mclachlan-better-broken-concert-tour-hits-san-francisco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/74827\/","title":{"rendered":"Sarah McLachlan Better Broken concert tour hits San Francisco"},"content":{"rendered":"

Having spent much of the last two years celebrating the old \u2014 with the Fumbling Towards Ecstasy 30th Anniversary Tour \u2014 Sarah McLachlan<\/a> is now onto something new.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a brand new show, with brand new songs off the new album called \u2018Better Broken,’\u201d McLachlan<\/a> told the capacity crowd at the Masonic in San Francisco on Friday. \u201cI\u2019m going to pepper the set with new stuff, but there will be lots of old, familiar stuff as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

New path, but one thing definitely remains the same as ever: her voice is better than ice cream. And, yes, that includes cookie dough ice cream.<\/p>\n

During the course of nearly two hours, and running through 20 songs from more than 30 years of her stellar career, McLachlan\u2019s voice<\/a> was nothing short of exquisite, divine, miraculous, wondrous \u2014 take your pick of highly complementary adjectives, since they all pretty much work in this situation.<\/p>\n

The 57-year-old Canadian singer-songwriter<\/a> \u2014 who became a household name in the \u201990s while leading the blockbuster Lilith Fair tours<\/a> and selling millions upon millions of records \u2014 took the stage at 8:20 p.m., some 10-15 minutes before her band would join her, and opened the show with a brilliant solo-piano version of the new album\u2019s title track.<\/p>\n

\"SarahSarah McLachlan greets the crowd during her \u201cBetter Broken\u201d tour at the Masonic Auditorium in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Nov. 28, 2005. (Jane Tyska\/Bay Area News Group)\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was one of seven tunes performed from the recently released \u201cBetter Broken,\u201d McLachlan\u2019s long-overdue 10th studio album that marks her first collection of new original music since 2014\u2019s \u201cShine On.\u201d Of course, 11 years is a long time to make fans wait for new material, but this batch of music may just be worth it \u2014 ranking among the finest albums of 2025.<\/p>\n

She\u2019d remain alone on the stage for the first three songs (and change) \u2014 thrilling the crowd with \u201cFumbling\u201d favorite \u201cPossession\u201d then introducing the new song \u201cOnly Human\u201d \u2014 before the five-piece band joined a few moments into \u201cI Will Remember You.\u201d<\/p>\n

As per usual, McLachlan<\/a> was quite personable and charming on stage, opening up to the crowd about a number of challenges and key moments of her life. She\u2019d use these stories, as many of the best performers do, to add depth and reveal meaning to the music.<\/p>\n

For instance, she provided background \u2014 background that she kept to herself for quite some time \u2014 on her first-ever top five pop hit, \u201cAdia,\u201d from the mega-popular album \u201cSurfacing\u201d from 1997. McLachlan explained how the song was inspired by the pain she caused to one of her friends.<\/p>\n

\u201cI basically crossed a line you were never supposed to cross,\u201d she told the crowd. \u201cI fell in love with my best friend\u2019s ex.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Audible groans from the audience)<\/p>\n

\"SarahSarah McLachlan performs during her \u201cBetter Broken\u201d tour at the Masonic Auditorium in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Nov. 28, 2005. (Jane Tyska\/Bay Area News Group)\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah,\u201d McLachlan continued. \u201cIt was, obviously, completely unplanned. This door swung open and there was no closing it. I was young and dumb. I did not not handle it very well at all. And my friend was really, really hurt \u2014 no surprise.\u201d<\/p>\n

The man in the middle of the drama, McLachlan explained, is long gone, but the singer and the woman patched things up and are \u201cstill best friends.\u201d The revelation provoked the most humorous crowd response of the night, as one female fan loudly yelled out the mission statement: \u201cSisters before misters!\u201d<\/p>\n

With a good belly laugh to move her forward, McLachlan continued to mix old and new, going from yet another \u201cSurfacing\u201d \u201990s pop classic \u2014 \u201cBuilding a Mystery\u201d \u2014 into the \u201cBetter Broken\u201d track \u201cReminds Me.\u201d McLachlan described the latter as her attempt at writing a country song, having been inspired by hours spent binging \u201cYellowstone\u201d during the pandemic.<\/p>\n

The setlist was almost entirely built from the new album and her two huge hit platters of the \u201990s \u2014 \u201cFumbling Toward Ecstasy\u201d and \u201cSurfacing\u201d \u2014 as well a pair of tracks from the multiplatinum 2003 affair \u201cAfterglow.\u201d That\u2019s understandable, since it allowed McLachlan ample opportunity to support \u201cBetter Broken\u201d while still giving fans all the big radio hits.<\/p>\n

\"SarahSarah McLachlan performs during her \u201cBetter Broken\u201d tour at the Masonic Auditorium in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Nov. 28, 2005. (Jane Tyska\/Bay Area News Group)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Yet, it\u2019s still a shame that McLachlan didn\u2019t touch on her earlier material \u2014 especially 1991\u2019s \u201cSolace,\u201d which may just be the finest album in her catalog \u2014 and that she ignored her very worthy, yet far-less commercially successful later records like 2010\u2019s \u201cLaws of Illusion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also, McLachlan has built herself a pretty impressive resume as a Christmas crooner, having released two very well received seasonal efforts \u2014 the platinum-plus-selling \u201cWintersong\u201d of 2006 and the 2016 follow-up \u201cWonderland.\u201d So, it would have been really nice to hear her toss in a few holiday favorites into the mix \u2014 perhaps her great versions of \u201cO Little Town of Bethlehem\u201d or \u201cSilent Night\u201d \u2014 given the timing.<\/p>\n

But it was hard to quibble about the setlist as McLachlan and her superb band just kept right on performing one winner after another, including some really memorable takes on the \u201cFumbling Towards Ecstasy\u201d cuts \u201cElsewhere\u201d (featuring a stellar guitar solo from Luke Doucet) and the fun crowd sing-along on \u201cIce Cream.\u201d<\/p>\n

McLachlan closed the main set with two more \u201cFumbling\u201d tracks \u2014 a volcanic vocal take on \u201cFear\u201d that prompted an exuberant standing ovation from the crowd and then, to close, the title track.<\/p>\n

But McLachlan quickly returned with a two-song encore that mimicked the back-and-forth nature of the overall set \u2014 starting out with the final new song of the night, \u201cGravity,\u201d before closing the night in superb fashion with longtime fan-favorite \u201cAngel.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"SarahSarah McLachlan greets the crowd during her \u201cBetter Broken\u201d tour at the Masonic Auditorium in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Nov. 28, 2005. (Jane Tyska\/Bay Area News Group)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sarah McLachlan setlist:
1. \u201cBetter Broken\u201d
2. \u201cPossession\u201d
3. \u201cOnly Human\u201d
4. \u201cI Will Remember You\u201d
5. \u201cAdia\u201d
6. \u201cBuilding a Mystery\u201d
7. \u201cReminds Me\u201d
8. \u201cWait\u201d
9. \u201cWorld on Fire\u201d
10. \u201cOne in a Long Line\u201d
11. \u201cSweet Surrender\u201d
12. \u201cThe Last to Go\u201d
13. \u201cAnswer\u201d
14. \u201cElsewhere\u201d
15. \u201cIce Cream\u201d
16. \u201cIf This Is the End\u2026\u201d
17. \u201cFear\u201d
18. \u201cFumbling Towards Ecstasy\u201d
Encore:
19. \u201cGravity\u201d
20. \u201cAngel\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Having spent much of the last two years celebrating the old \u2014 with the Fumbling Towards Ecstasy 30th…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74828,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[184,7,2644,1533,181,330,395,8257,8258,101,396,103,102,104,106,105,420,77],"class_list":{"0":"post-74827","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-bay-area","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-concerts","11":"tag-keywee","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-peninsula","15":"tag-pop-music","16":"tag-rock-music","17":"tag-san-francisco","18":"tag-san-francisco-county","19":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","20":"tag-san-francisco-news","21":"tag-sf","22":"tag-sf-headlines","23":"tag-sf-news","24":"tag-things-to-do","25":"tag-uncategorized"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74827\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74828"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}