Bedingfield Sings at fuse’s TCA Coming Out Party

It seems music channel fuse changes course as often as the Sun rises.

This time out the channel is hell bent on original programming, announcing Tuesday at TCA a lineup of documentaries, reality series and what a network official describes as a variation on ESPN’s excellent verbal ping-pong session “Pardon the Interruption,” except fuse’s version will feature debate about music not sports. Yet, fuse officials at TCA emphasized the network’s still about the music. If the network’s party for critics was an indication, yes, fuse knows from music.

You never know what prompts a TCA critic to write about a network. Sometimes it’s plain, old relationship building—the network gets scribbles when a critic feels good about something associated with a programmer. If so, fuse will get plenty of ink based on critics’ reaction to a performance Tuesday night by singer Natasha Bedingfield , seen above, at left, with fuse pr hand Amy Lynn, and below during the performance. The striking blonde Brit performed for just 40 minutes for an intimate but thoroughly delighted group of about 50 TCA hacks. It was a masterful mix of the right performer working with appropriate forces in the correct setting.

Bedingfield said she was singing “scaled-down versions” of her songs, but there was nothing small about her vocal styling or the quality of the ensemble of acoustic guitar, keyboard and two back-up singers. The group, modest in size only, demonstrated conclusively that excellent music can be made with minimal input from the local power company. Working without a drummer, Bedingfield and company swung hard when necessary, plunging deep into soul numbers, but never getting too loud. Showing a versatility that’s uncommon in pop music, Bedingfield also crooned, but always with the hint of a hard edge, on ballads.

This soft-hard mix was present throughout Bedingfield’s set. Her short set alternated between sunny and darker numbers. Her short denim skirt reeked of rock band grunge, but her shapely legs and taut midriff were bare, exposing angelic skin sans visible tattoos. Her between-songs patter had a similar dichotomy, mixing literacy with sharp bite. Noting that a song she was about to sing was inspired by the book “Men are From Mars, Women are from Venus,” she said, “I hated that book, which says that men and women think differently…I hated it because it gave men the excuse to act like assholes.” The audience roared at that one, and throughout the performance.