the Femmes, Miller Lite Oasis

I had seen, on the Violent Femmes' website, that they were doing a show on May 27th. I had forgotten about it until the night before. The show was to "open" the new stage that Miller had built on the Summerfest grounds (called The Miller Light Oasis, I guess). So naturally, Cyn and I were wanting to go. Nine o'clock yesterday morning, my friend Joe called, saying he'd gotten us tickets. Turns out that the show was by invitation only. You had to get tickets from the various promotions that were being run. It was a good thing that he got them, or we would have been thwarted at the gate.

There were four bands playing. We arrived in time to see the second. The Five Card Studs. Oh boy. were they. great.

After that was Ben Folds. I was a bit disappointed in his show. I just couldn't get into it, somehow.

Naturally, the Femmes did a fun show. The crowd contributed to that. Being warm out, it was the first summer night this year. People were out dancing, drinking and having fun. There was a drunk guy next to me, who was talking with me during Folds's set. Mostly he was pointing out the obvious, but a few things he said were just dumb. At the start of the show, Victor said, "we're honored to be here, at the Miller Light Violent Femmes stage."

The show was... interesting. Fun, as always, but things were a little different.

Since Victor's rhythm is a little uneven sometimes, Ritchie has another percussion player onstage. John Sparrow on the cajon box. That's a wooden box that you sit on, and rech down between your legs to hit. You can get a surprising amount of sounds out of it - it sounds like a whole drum kit (minus cymbals).

Gordon's guitar has been getting weak, lately. He's always been rather minimalist, doing very few solos, and mostly little staccato strums, rather than strong chords. Tonight, they had a backup guitarist named Jeff Hamilton for a few songs. Half a dozen, maybe. He still didn't add that much to the sound, except on "Children of the Revolution," where he did a loud, distortion filled lead.

As an intro to "Jesus Walking on the Water," Gordon did a short a capella (or was he strumming his violin, too?) hymn. Something about Jesus walking on the sea. Then Perry DeLorenzo (Victor's daughter? Niece?) joined him on the violin. There was also a washboard player and a mandolin player, who also played on "Country Death Song" and one other I think.

Songs included, Blister in the Sun, Kiss Off, Please Do Not Go, Add It Up, Confessions, Prove My Love, Gone Daddy Gone, Good Feeling, Gimme the Car, Country Death Song, Jesus Walking on the Water, Hallowed Ground, Black Girls, I Held Her in My Arms, Children of the Revolution and American Music. Almost all early songs.

The Horns of Dilemma played on their usual "Confessions" and "Black Girls". They also played on "I Held Her in My Arms," but that seemed like a mistake. Aside from some technical difficulties, the Horns generally did not play well. That's how they're usually supposed to play, but I don't think it worked on this song. The band seemed to agree, but maybe that was my imagination. After "I Held Her in My Arms," the band seemed to need to regroup. They then played "Hallowed Ground," with just the three of them (plus Sparrow) - no keyboards. It sounded pretty good.

Sparrow did a nice cajon box solo in "Black Girls." The audience really got into "American Music" and "Gimme the Car." Victor knocked his drums over a couple of times, and played them on the floor. I think it was accidental, once. Brian only played electric bass, acoustic bass, one-string bass, and conch shell.

The band did two more shows in the Milwaukee area, later in the summer, including one at Summerfest, but I missed them both.