Last year was a great year for me musically. I saw Wilco, Sonic Youth, Cat Power (twice), Tom Waits, and Broken Social Scene (twice). This year hasn’t been quite as good, but were are only halfway through. So here it goes:
Jeff Tweedy
Bijou Theater – Knoxville, Tn
The Bijou holds around 700 people. Its in downtown Knoxville and is gorgeous. This was my second time at the Bijou, the first being Broken Social Scene. I was a little nervous that the crowd was going to be rowdy, but everyone was nice and quiet during the show.
Jeff came out and opened with Patient With Me, from Sky Blue Sky. Then he went into Remember the Mountain Bed and Spiders. At that point he could have said goodnight and walked off stage and I would have been satisfied. He continued through the set pulling out some surprises like Chinese Apple and Pieholden Suite. He was in a great mood, joking with the audience in between songs. He closed the show with Someone Else’s Song and Acuff-Rose without the PA.
As it turns out I could have met Jeff if I had hung outside by his bus for about 10 minutes after the show, but I didn’t. Now I just need to get to one of those living room shows…
My Morning Jacket
The Orange Peel – Asheville, NC
I missed the Jacket last year at the Tennessee Theater, so I was thrilled when I saw they were playing Asheville. I got there fairly early and met some really nice people. Jim played on the last song with the opening band, Follow The Train, wearing a Frankenstein mask.
About 45 minutes later they take the stage and open with One Big Holiday. They blew the roof off the Orange Peel. Check out this video for proof. I had a great time rocking out with the Jacket. This is probably the best show I’ve seen all year.
The Flaming Lips
The Classic Theater – Athens, Ga
I’ll admit I’m not the biggest Lips fan it the world, but I wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to see them. The Classic Theater holds around 2000 people. I wasn’t too impressed with it. Spiderman and Space Ghost were handing out laser pointers before the show. The Lips take the stage and open with Race For The Prize. Wayne is shooting confetti everywhere and a ton of balloons fall from the ceiling. It is really a unique experience.
They continued mostly playing songs from the last three albums. During Vein of Stars we all shot Wayne with our lasers. It was a great experience and I hope to do it again. The only disappointment was I was hoping for War Pigs. Oh well, you can’t have everything.
Arcade Fire / The National
Thomas Wolfe Auditorium – Asheville, NC
Finally, I get to go to a show were I am looking forward to the opening bands set. I had just started listening to the National about a month before the show so it was a treat to see them.
The only downer was after the National finished their set, we started gathering in front of the stage, and the woman in charge of security was yelling at people to get back to their seats. Then I heard a guy from Arcade Fire’s crew talking to her, saying that Win was going to tell everyone to come up front. She started bitching about that, wanting to be notified before he did it. Anyway, Win told us that we were more than welcome to come closer after the first song.
Another side note, I had an extra ticket but was having trouble getting rid of it before the show. It was about 15 til 8 and I didn’t want to miss the National, so I gave my extra ticket to a guy I had been talking to out front and told him he could stay and sale it if he wanted to. I was going to let him have it, but he insisted on taking my number so he could call me if he sold it. Sure enough he did, and even then I had to force him to keep some of the money. Anyway, just a side note that their are still some good, stand-up people out there.
Once again I found out that if I had just stayed outside the venue for around 45 minutes I could have met the band and hung out with them at a bar. Live and learn…
Dinosaur Jr
The Fillmore at Irving Plaza – New York
Great show. Loud as hell, but not as loud as I was expecting. They played a nice mix of older tunes as well as most of the highlights from Beyond. Just Like Heaven making an appearance early in the set was nice. I would write more but I just talking about this show in my previous post.
So thats it for this year. The only other show I plan on seeing this year is Andrew Bird in Asheville. Hopefully I can find some more shows to go to in the southeast area.
