Photo by Joe Agius

Back to school week means a fresh crop of fresh faces trying to figure out what Boston is about. Is it the beans? Is it Matt Damon? Ben Affleck (as Batman)? It certainly isn’t Mark Wahlberg. That’s the consensus Hatchie and Orchin came to at their sold out Great Scott show on Thursday. They played to a packed room of newly minted denizens of Harvard Ave. who knew to get to the gig but weren’t quite sure what made Boston famous besides clam chowder and the Pixies. (But if you’re reading this now, Allston Pudding can fill you in on all the current local talent You Oughta Know.)

Orchin set sail across the divide between dream pop and noise. The bass was a mesmerizing focal point; you could feel the sound so deep in your gut, it felt like the floor was going to open. But when the vocals rung harmoniously in tune with the keys, suddenly you weren’t falling after all…you were floating among the clouds. They’re slow but upbeat. The quickstep snare would have been the icing on the celestial cake, but the bassist’s violin cameo eked ahead in the end. 

Photo by Sophie Hur

Photographers in the pit seemed intent on capturing Hatchie with fractal prisms, carrying forth her dreamy vocals and bass in soft sparkly images. But with this Summer’s release of her debut album Keepsake, she’s revealed that her image isn’t all Sugar & Spice. For every song of longing, like the new “Obsessed” and “Without a Blush” or last year’s hit single “Sure,” there are songs of self-determination, like “Her Own Heart.” (Which tapped into some Cranberries energy, sounding like it could be the child of “Dreams,” with foggy self-backing vocals and fanciful guitar.) Hatchie may have an ex on her mind, but she has her power to knuckle her way through the heartbreak with memories as keepsakes.

Listen to Keepsake here: