Dijon Commands L'Olympia with Unpredictable Energy

Most people have at least one artist they tell themselves they must see live one day. Some years they just don’t come to your city, or the dates don’t work out, or the album releases don’t come as often as you’d hoped. But finally, on a Friday in late November, as I was standing at the back of a crowd, eyes very slowly closing and opening again, looking around at the marvel that is the L’Olympia venue, I had experienced that sweet satisfaction of checking Dijon off my list. 

Around mid-August of this year, I took two of my best friends to my late-grandmother’s home on the waterfront of Mayne Island, BC. After a day of whimsical, child-like fun that felt like four days squished into one, we sat in front of the TV and watched Dijon’s short film: Absolutely. It makes me emotional every time I see it; a stunning live performance of tracks off the 2021 album that can’t be described as anything else but raw, musical magic. My friend Aliyah is sitting on the floor, and we realize Dijon is going on tour soon. She says, “If I can’t get tickets for the Vancouver show, I’m coming to Montreal.” And that she did, along with my partner from Ottawa, making for a night I knew would be filled with love, beaming light and memories. 

Dijon’s style has become increasingly polarizing, and he wears it on the sleeve of his live performances. Whereas his debut album, Absolutely, was tender, soft, and heartbreaking, Baby packs a punch that hits you from all angles. Its radical leap from the acoustic and mellow tones is unapologetic. Drums and random vocal snippets played loudly between tracks, making for almost no silences throughout the entire show. Even when starting it off with the song “Many Times” from Absolutely, it was fast and loud and had a totally different feel, making you wanna jump up and down rather than hold your head in your hands. 

But it wasn’t complete chaos. It was like a mature tenderness that embodied themes of sacrifice and of changing life stages, the album being named after his son and the music reflecting that transition. The intense sampling from the recorded album is amplified in the performance and fills the whole space with sounds from all directions, with a mesmerizing light show that flashes on cue. My face hurt from smiling, and everyone else around me was beaming. It was hard not to be pumped up for whatever would come next. 

Dijon also has a uniquely passionate voice. My boyfriend Caleb and I joke about how he sings in cursive, which you could hear so crisply through the loudspeakers. Like his close pal Mk.gee, he’s not afraid to screech and yelp between words. Even in the slower songs, where he sang low and soft, the light in his voice never dimmed, and his eyes were squeezed shut with intense focus. I’ve got to give props to his drummer, too, who was grooving to the music the whole time with his cymbals positioned high as hell. 

With Dijon growing in popularity, even gaining the title of Pitchfork’s “Artist of the Year” for 2025, I’ve sometimes contemplated whether his new direction in music is still for me. Music rooted in spontaneity and an improvisational nature can be destabilizing, making you rethink where you stand with the artist and if what they think is working, is really working for you. Seeing someone you admire perform live can settle that, I think. Intently watching how they move through the process, interact with the crowd, their instruments and their collaborators is telling.

The story Dijon told that night gave me all the assurance I needed. You can tell he cares, maybe too much and to his own fault. I read Paul Thompson’s Pitchfork article that talks a lot about his struggle in crafting this album, but it seems to have paid off. His on-stage crew were smiling ear-to-ear watching him sing, and the interactive nature between them was lovely and free. There wasn’t a ton of crowd interaction as I’ve seen in clips of his other shows, but I was there for the music, which was strongly delivered.