Recap Moby at the Vic Theatre

Throughout his concert last night at the Vic, Moby paused between songs to check in with his audience, asking how the room was feeling and making sure everyone was having fun. A nice touch, but hardly necessary; the sold-out crowd was danced during the entire show. And while he joked by citing insecurity as the cause of such concern, it would help explain the evening's setlist: heavy on fan-favorites and hits from the electronic artist's most recognized albums, his 1999 commercial breakthrough album, Play, and its similarly toned follow-up, 2002's 18.

What Moby lacked in setlist variety he made up for in re-imagining familiar material. Accompanied by up to six onstage collaborators throughout the evening, including a rotating array of female guest vocalists, Moby took the opportunity to add new dimensions to his previously sample-reliant work. One-time mega-hit "South Side," which Moby credited as inspired in part by his time in Chicago, became a chugging, riff-heavy rock venture. "Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?" on the other hand turned into a slow, swaying soul song, backed by piano, violin, and guest vocalist Inyang Bassey hitting piercing yet melancholy notes. Recent material was also retooled: Moby and his crew applied a bluesy, stripped-down treatment to a condensed version of "Pale Horses," off this summer's Wait For Me.

For all of the group's barebones soul, however, Moby and his band proved more than capable of executing large-scale productions. Dipping into 2005's Hotel, the group amped up "Raining Again" with a wall of backing noise from the stage's set drummer, bongo drums, and a pogo-ing sampled beat, while a magenta-clad strobe flashed behind the collective. And a new, unreleased selection proved tense and ominous with a heavier-rock feel as Moby shouted out the chorus over a darkwave-tinged beat. Such moments provided variety during an evening populated primarily by best-of cuts and one-time radio staples. Yet while Moby may have chosen to return to his past again and again, it hardly prevented the electronic savant from making the old sound new again.