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Wilco @ Charlottesville Pavilion, 10/20/07
Where the hell do I start? So much to talk about - and I will, at great length - but, first things first: Setlist.
Sunken Treasure
You Are My Face
I Am Trying To Break Your Heart
Shake It Off
Handshake Drugs
Impossible Germany
Sky Blue Sky
It's Just That Simple
Muzzle of Bees
Shot In The Arm
Side With The Seeds
Hummingbird
War On War
Via Chicago
Jesus, Etc.
Too Far Gone
Walken
I'm The Man Who Loves You
Misunderstood
Hate It Here
Heavy Metal Drummer
Red-Eyed And Blue
I Got You (At The End Of The Century)
Casino Queen
Outtasite (Outtamind)
Hoodoo Voodoo
Kidsmoke2 hours, 27 minutes, and 9 seconds of awesome; not one, not two, but THREE encores; a ton of photos... This show was worth every bit of the $40 ticket price and more. It was worth the two-hour drive, one way; it was worth having to stand for 5+ hours sandwiched between drunk college kidz. It was worth everything. Period.
They started out slow with "Sunken Treasure," a quiet, winding tune, and followed it up with another subdued track from Sky Blue Sky, "You Are My Face." It wasn't until the opening note of "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart" hit that the crowd immediately broke into noticeably louder cheers and applause (click the link to listen). I was so happy to see such instant recognition of... whatever the hell that sound is, exactly... because I love that song to pieces and I'm incredibly biased. :)
God bless Mikael Jorgensen (left).You might recall, when Sky Blue Sky first hit, I was not as impressed as I had expected to be. Sky Blue Sky was very different for me in that respect, considering that I'd fallen IMMEDIATELY in love with just about everything on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot the very first time I listened to it (and similarly with other Wilco albums). I had to put a lot more effort into finding tracks I liked on Sky Blue Sky, but I'm happy to report that I finally have (there aren't that many, but they're there). Unfortunately, out of the six tracks from SBS that were played that night, I really liked one ("Impossible Germany"), kinda liked two ("Walken" and "Side With The Seeds") and could've really done without the other three. (They also did not play the track I consider to be SBS's best - "Leave Me Like You Found Me.") Oh well. They got those out of the way fairly early into the show, and soon moved onto playing things I was much more into.
The other real standouts of the show for me were some of my all-time Wilco favorites - "Handshake Drugs," "Muzzle of Bees," "War on War," "Heavy Metal Drummer" (you can hear everyone singing along, totally unprompted), "Red-Eyed and Blue," and "Outtasite (Outtamind)."
Jeff Tweedy was his usual conversational self that night as well. One of the most amusing parts of the entire show happened while Tweedy was asking us to sing along to the next song ("Jesus, Etc"), and lamented the sorry participation he'd gotten from previous shows...
Which was funny in and of itself, but what was even more hysterical was that Tweedy had been talking for a while by this point - so when Tweedy finally decided he'd talked long enough, and it was time to play, he finished up - "All right, let's go," expecting the band to break into the next song... except, nothing happened. Tweedy turned around, saw Glenn Kotche (who was only half paying attention by this point) messing with something by his feet, gave him this look, and clarified "Now!"
I think he was just adjusting his equipment, but it the look on Kotche's face was just adorable... much like the infectiously energetic drummer himself.
Notice the Sky Blue Sky-themed drum artwork. <3I can also now confirm that every last bit of hype I'd read about Nels Cline is absolutely true. There were times when his hands and fingers were moving so ungodly fast that it just looked like a blur. He played with his guitar behind his back; he played with it laid flat on his lap, he'd leave it resonating while he walked away, and then would pick it right back up and jump straight into one of many impressive solos that night, one of which was shared in turn with Pat Sansone. He stood up from the keyboard he'd been sitting at most of the night - stuck squarely behind John Stirratt, unfortunately - to stretch his strings.
Also? Nels Cline is freaking TALL. He was wearing boots and socks that came partway up his calf, and his pants? Yeah, they didn't even touch the top of his socks. I actually did not notice this at first until the drunk college kidz to my right noticed and seemed to be in awe. "That's awesome, man!" If you look real close in the photo above, you can almost sorta see it.
The band left the stage and came back for encores three times before they finally said goodbye for good...
The only way this show could have been any better is if they had played "Say You Miss Me," or "Far, Far Away," but those are really simple songs and would have been ill-suited to the full arsenal of instruments and musicians they had that night (probably better for a Tweedy solo show, in my opinion). And, the pictures could've been a little better - the combination of low lighting and near-constant movement made it difficult - but, you know what? That just gives me an excuse to go see them next time and try again. ;)
4 Comments |
Saturday October 27th 2007 at 12:02pm from Jenny +
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So, like, where did the audio come from? Is it yours?
Nope, not mine. Someone at the show got it all and put it on the internet - which is cool, that Wilco allows such things.
It's great, though. I can throw on the CD, put the pictures on slideshow, and it's just like being there all over again - only without the drunk college kidz.
Don't kid yourself, your pics are freaking great!!! This whole post is pretty overwhelming so I'll probably have more comments to add after I listen to the audio..:)
Thanks for the great review!!
I am sooooo jealous!