Regina Spektor’s Howl

“This is a nice way to be … surrounded,” quipped Regina Spektor as she walked out on stage of the Walt Disney auditorium in Los Angeles last week. The auditorium’s stage is ensconced inside a large oval, with seating on all sides, and Spektor’s trademark bit of dark humor—a mixture of claustrophobia and warmth turned into a joke—was the perfect opening for this concert, which, as it unraveled, felt increasingly cathartic and ritualistic.