Tag: Concerts

the traffic is awful, it’s a long way away, and if you don’t get there like an hour and a half before the show starts you are virtually guaranteed to be sitting at the back of the venue behind a post.

today, for some crazy reason, we got there barely 45 minutes before the show, and the parking lot was so abandoned that we thought the show was canceled.

we sailed through the lobby unmolested — except for the bouncer asking if he could check my “purse” — and sat down about 8 feet off the front of the stage.

crazy.

a couple months ago, around the time we were buying tickets to the show, we tripped across a tift merritt album we didn’t own (“another country”) and downloaded it from itunes. we figured we’d be okay at the concert anyway, since we knew her first two albums.

turns out we were actually TWO albums behind, so knew just three of the 18 songs.

we *still* did okay, which probably says something about tift and her band … i’m not sure i’ve ever been to a concert where i knew so few of the songs, yet still had such a great time.

the show was actually stolen by her husband (the drummer) of all people, who during the encore did a solo / ukulele number called “Evel Knievel for My Girl”, which really has to be seen to be fully appreciated.

SET LIST: The Things That Everybody Does · All The Reasons We Don’t Have To Fight · Engine To Turn · Six More Days Of Rain · Mixtape · I Know What I’m Looking For Now · After Today · Something To Me · Never Talk About It · Stray Paper · Papercut · Broken · Feel Of The World · See You On The Moon · Ain’t Looking Closely · Evel Knievel · Bramble Rose · Danny’s Song · Another Country

words can not describe how bizzare this evening was.

when I walked into the venue, they were belting “easy lover” on the pre-concert music loop, which makes me wonder if The Killers would list Phil Collins as one of their influences.

there were geeks everywhere (not that I fall outside that definition) and the geeky-er the male, the more the women hanging aroud them.

and somehow the alpha-geeks managed somehow to get The Killers to play? it was like I was in some crazy parallel universe where geeks weren’t the ones who got stuffed in their gym lockers in high school.

and it was arguably the best concert I’ve ever seen … even factoring in the age-inappropriately dressed 45 year olds, the legions of men in oxford shirts, and the 10:1 male-to-female ratio.

we were 10 yards from the band. they opened on fire, and kept the pedal down for the full hour and a half, through 15 songs.

the band was crazy into the show, even though they admitted they “didn’t know what to expect” when they showed up.

it’s still sinking in that the best concert of my life was a paid appearance at a web analytics conference. really, how bad must the rest have been?

not sure I can lay claim to having any street cred what-so-ever after this.

SET LIST: human, somebody told me, for reasons unknown, bones, the world we live in, shadowplay, jenny was a friend of mine, smile like you mean it, spaceman, a dustland fairytale, I can’t help falling in love with you, read my mind, mr. brightside, all these things that i’ve done, when you were young.

it was part of the Israel@60 celebration on the mall, so it was a limited set to an age-diverse audience where no one over the age of 35 knew any of the songs … so, even through they were extremely appreciative in between songs, it wasn’t really a “participatory” crowd.

we also felt a little unsettled from being (seemingly) the only people there who didn’t have a strong religious/ideological reason to attend, compounded by the fact that i’m pretty sure that i was the only one there who had spent any extended amount time in Syria.

oh, and the panel truck continually circling the mall while plastered with pro-palestinian propaganda didn’t helping us feel very comfy, either.

anyway, two songs in regina forgot the lyrics to the song she was singing … which (fortunately for her) was the song making the Adult Alternative radio rounds at the moment, so the crowd just sang parts of it without her. (later, she blamed the dual pressure of performing for an event for Israel while in the shadow of the Capitol building.)

she plowed through the rest of the show without incident, but it wasn’t quite the intimate, personal concert that she’s known for … so, i’m going to chalk this one up to being a missed opportunity and try and see her live in a more conventional setting.

SET LIST: Bobbin’ for Apples, On the Radio, That Time, One More Time with Feeling, Ghost of Corporate Future, Apres Moi, Better, The Flowers, Poor Little Rich Boy, Ain’t No Cover, Fidelity, Us, Summer in the City, Samson, Hotel Song

1. at one point, she was rocking her guitar so hard, it came unplugged, and she didn’t notice until her husband plugged it back in after a couple minutes;
2. she forgot to pee before the show started, so darted off during a guitar solo, took care of business, and ran back;
3. she confessed a celebrity crush on hockey enforcer Marty McSorley, and described all the things she would do to him if he agreed to help her with the video of one of her songs.

SET LIST: mercury · in state · what are you waiting for · asking for flowers · run · copied keys · i make the dough, you get the glory · 12 bellvue · alicia ross · i can’t give you up · buffalo · six oclock news · summer long · good things · oil man’s war · the cheapest key · goodnight, california · back to me

Liz was touring small venues in support of her yet to be released new album (Somebody’s Miracle) and probably to apologize for her eponymous previous album (that I seemed to be the only person alive who was able to tolerate, though i still prefer her first three albums).

anyway, great show. light hearted, all acoustic. the lady sparkler and i (and two good friends) got the feeling that she was sleeping with her guitarist, and it turns out we were right.

the missus even finally picked up a liz phair song that she actually liked (title song from Somebody’s Miracle) which — in her mind — is good enough to make up for the first three albums.

SET LIST: Polyester Bride · Never Said · Flower · Baby Got Going · Extraordinary · Table for One · Mezmerizing · May Queen · Somebody’s Miracle · Soap Star Joe · 6’1″ · Closer To You · Explain It To Me · Everything to Me · Uncle Alvarez · Divorce Song · Supernova · F*** & Run · Why Can’t I? · Hurricane Cincy / Cyclone · H.W.C.

another flashback post, where i copied down the set list, and then forgot to actually put it up. i remember nothing about this concert … except that the lady sparkler and i sat directly behind James McMurtry’s mom.

she’s a very nice woman, fwiw.

SET LIST: Saint Mary Of The Woods, Fraulein O., Red Dress, No More Buffalo, 60 Acres, Rachel’s Song, Out Here In The Middle, Choctaw Bingo, Lights Of Cheyenne, Levelland, Max’s Theorem, I’m Not From Here, Too Long In The Wasteland, Rex’s Blues