All the Concerts Fit to Print

I'm not very familiar with Steve Hackett, the original guitarist of Genesis. I've always kinda wanted to see him. He announced this tour where he was performing Genesis's Selling England By the Pound, and we got tickets.

He played that, and a lot of tracks from Spectral Mornings. Steve sounds great. He did a bit of singing, but his guitar is where he shines. The band sounded great. The keyboardist, Roger King (?), was really great. The vocalist, Nad Sylvan, was a bit odd onstage, but he sounded much like Peter Gabriel. The bassist, (?), occasionally played a doubleneck guitar/bass. The drummer, Craig Blundell, was really good. Watching him reminded me how good Phil Collins was, back in the day. And Rob Townsend played keyboards, flute and tenor and soprano saxes, among a few other things.

Selling England was awesome, of course. They didn't play all the songs note-for-note like the original album. One song in particular was very funky. Looking at the setlist, "Deja Vu" could have included the drum solo. "Dance On A Volcano" is also a Genesis song.

( Setlist )

It seems Jethro Tull is no more. I would think Barre would still be up for it, but the rest of the last band resigned, so I guess Anderson's just doing the solo thing now, whether he's playing Tull or not.

Since this tour was entitled The Best of Jethro Tull (or so my ticket says), I was expecting nothing but Tull. The fact that the first six or more songs were not Tull was a little disappointing. Not that it was bad music, it just didn't meet expectations. Expectations that were based on an explicit message. Though I now see some advertising that reads "Homo Erraticus & The Best of Jethro Tull."

The band opened with seven songs from Anderson's latest album, Homo Erraticus. They were pretty good, in my opinion, and got a positive reception from the audients. Nothing too exciting, but solid. They then went into "Bourée," and ended the first half with "Thick As a Brick." "Bourée" was great, but I was disappointed at the inclusion of Brick, since the last time we saw them, two years ago, was the Thick As A Brick tour.

The second half saw a more interesting selection of songs. As it was billed as a "Best Of" show, they concentrated on singles. Six of the nine songs of the second half had been singles, and the other three were all popular tunes, with the exception of an excerpt from A Passion Play, apparently entitled "Critique Oblique." And of course they closed with "Locomotive Breath." Again. I enjoyed it much more the last time.

Most of these tunes are not among my favorites. "Living in the Past," "Teacher," "Critique Oblique," "Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll," "Farm on the Freeway" - not thrilling. I did quite enjoy "With You There to Help Me," "Sweet Dream" and "Aqualung." Oh well. Can't win 'em all.

Ian's voice is pretty well shot. It seems to have gone downhill even in the last two years. It's odd because his speaking voice is still deep, but it's an obvious strain for him to sing. So he's got a vocalist along on the tour. Ryan O'Donnell traded lyrics with Anderson on many songs. He does a decent job at it. I wish he'd sing more. Any song where Ian plays flute or guitar should be fine to hand over the vocal reins. The whole band was the same as the last tour. John O'Hara on keyboards, Florian Opahle on electric guitar, David Goodier on bass and Scott Hammond on drums.

There was no opening act, but before the show started they played videos from friends on the big screen on the stage. That was nice background music.

Setlist:
Doggerland
Enter the Uninvited
Puer Ferox Adventus
The Engineer
Tripudium Ad Bellum
The Browning of the Green
Cold Dead Reckoning
Bourée
Thick as a Brick

Living in the Past
With You There to Help Me
Sweet Dream
Teacher
Critique Oblique
Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll: Too Young to Die
Songs from the Wood
Farm on the Freeway
Aqualung

Locomotive Breath

This is the live version of Mystery Science Theater 3000. It has many people who were on MST3K, but they don't have rights to the name, so they call themselves Cinematic Titanic. There were five cast members, Joel Hodgson (Joel Robinson), Frank Coniff (TV's Frank), Trace Beaulieu (Dr. Forrester and Crow), Mary Jo Pehl (various, Pearl Forrester) and J. Elvis Weinstein (the original Crow and Dr. Erhardt).

Before the show started, an old guy named Groover came out occasionally to get the crowd going. Then the players (except Joel) came out one-by-one to talk, and basically do a little stand-up comedy. Frank did some political stuff, including a poem entitled "Why I like Scott Walker," and consisting only of two seconds of silence. A recent tweet of his was: "Dick Cheney is alive thanks to modern era of cardiology advances. Many others are dead thanks to modern era of Dick Cheney." I thought his political jokes were funny, but fortunately, there was no further political humor for the night.

After a break, Joel came out to start the movie. Everyone took their places (stools or chairs) on either side of the stage, started up their ipads (nice lighting on their faces), and the movie started. From there, it was pretty much what they've always done - say funny things about the movie, and make it look even worse than it already is. The movie was The Astral Factor. A convicted strangler, studying the paranormal in his jail cell, learns to make himself invisible. As an invisible man, he escapes from prison to stalk and strangle the five women who testified against him at his trial. Robert Foxworth plays the police lieutenant assigned to protect them, and to catch the invisible strangler. It was pretty bad. The cast included Elke Sommer and Stefanie Powers ("in her first no-pants role").

The crowd was kindof odd, in that it was very homogenous. Everyone there either was a geeky, goofy college kid, or had been one. There was a distinct bell curve, with the median age in the late thirties. Just a handful of teenagers, and a few "older" people, but mostly people in their thirties and forties. The show debuted on national television over 20 years ago, so there you go. The Pabst was sold out, and quite a few people had been to the show the previous night, since they do different movies every night.

Cyn and I took my dad and stepmom to see Madeleine Peyroux, for my dad's birthday. The show was at the Pabst Theater. Our tickets were in the third row of the orchestra pit, so we were looking up at the performers.

Nellie McKay opened the show. I had never heard her before, but found her performance quite enjoyable. She basically plays in what I'd call the style of 40's standards. It was a nice complement to Peyroux's music. Her delivery was naturalistic. She started out behind the piano, which belonged to Peyroux's band, and she had her back to the audience. Not being able to see her face, I didn't fully get her humor. For the latter part of her set, she came to center stage, to sing some songs with her ukelele. Her upbeat songs belied a cutting sarcastic humor, in some cases. Other songs were down-tempo love songs and laments. It was still a fun show.

Madeleine Peyroux is a jazz singer. Her style of singing is early 20th century, and her voice is often compared to Billie Holiday's. She had a four-piece band accompanying her and her acoustic guitar - keyboards, guitar, bass, drums. The show was very jazzy. Her vocals were rather exploratory - she seldom sang the tunes as they were known to the audience. This made it a little difficult for me to get into the songs. I would have been fine if she hadn't sung all her songs that way.

For her encore, she came back out with her guitar and with Nellie McKay. She sang a song in French, while Nellie "vocalized" a harmony.

This was different. It's Maynard Keenan's "solo" project. I found it interesting, and enjoyable, but Cyn loved it.

The opener was "comedian" Neil Hamburger. He was a parody of an old-time Borcht belter. He stood up there with a couple of cups clutched in his arm, and spouted horrible and often-tasteless one-liners. The humor wasn't in the jokes, it was in the image. And it gets old quickly.

Puscifer (rhymes with Lucifer), had a religious theme. Most of the band was dressed in Catholic garb - priest, pope, nun. Maynard wore a preacher's outfit (with his cowboy hat and mirrored sunglasses). They have a definite, if not overbearing, anti-religion theme.

Two or three of the bandmembers were from Ashes Divide. Billy Howerdel, I assume. The female singer, in her flowing, knee-length, sleeveless black dress and habit was Corina Round.

They had various video projected over the stage. Guitar and percussion were on stage left. Drums and keyboards were on stage right. In front of them, towards the center, was a little chair, couch and coffee table setup. The band would hang out there when they weren't playing or singing. Having a drink, or going online on a laptop. At the back of the stage was a raised platform. On it were two stands with monitors on the front. Behind the stands would stand the two singers. There were cameras which would transmit their faces to the monitors in front of them. So they'd be dancing, and but their faces were on screen. It seems part of Maynard's mo of keeping some distance between him and the audience. After the show, the band sat down, and Maynard had a little talk with the audience. he still sat towards the back of the stage, and didn't take off his shades.

Their music was variously dark, rhythmic, droning, danceable, powerful, provoking.

Review

Setlist:
Sour Grapes
Rev 22:20
Dozo
The Undertaker
Drunk With Power
Momma Sed
Indigo Children
Potions
Vagina Mine
Polar Bear
Trekka
Queen B
The Mission
The Humbling River

Available Light CD release party. Willy and his band, Dave Schoepke, Dave Adler, and... what's that guy's name... Steve Kleiber.

Rory Block opened.

Bo Ramsey and Pieta Brown opened up the show. Bo played guitar and Pieta sang her countryish songs.

Cyn said, "Taj finally took the stage after a too-long intermission. The crowd woke up and got excited. He charmed us, teased us, flirted with us, and got us moving, shouting, and clapping. Great music, as always. The man is highly talented."

at the Pabst. $29.50, frontish right.

Seventh row, center. Good show. It was mostly just Amy and Emily with their guitars. They didn't do the electric stuff that I like so much, but they folked out, hard. Fast and furious... err... I love the guitars and the harmonies. They're good at both.

They're both really good with the strings, though Emily did more solos. Amy played acoustic guitar and mandolin. Emily played those, plus electric guitar, electric banjo and piano. They had their bus driver sit in on piano for one song, and had Trina from three5human (the opening act) join them for "Closer to Fine," and the whole band for the last two songs.

Ian Anderson, leader, flautist and multi-instrumentalist of Jethro Tull, just embarked on a solo tour. He set it up as an intimate affair, with some audience participation. He had a local radio announcer onstage with him to do some interviewing, and bring some people up onstage to ask some questions.

I enjoyed the format, since Ian is a funny guy, and I like to hear stories and learn about artists and their craft. Much of the audience (or maybe it was a vocal minority) didn't care for the talking and wanted to hear more music. The music was a bit loose. The musicians seemed somewhat amateur, they were jetlagged, it was the opening night of the tour, it was quiet and acoustic, etc. The musicians were a keyboard/accordion player, a drummer, an acoustic guitarist (who had obviously studied and played classical guitar), and a bassist who is a respected proctologist (there's a joke about bassist and their strong fingers, someplace in there).

The selection of songs was great. Ian played many songs that he seldom or maybe had never played. He opened with his flute, playing to a backing track. It was representative of all things Tull and Anderson (at least in latter years), sort of an "Ian Tull Overture". After that, the first song he played was "Life's A Long Song". I was blown away, since that is not a well-known song, and is one of my most favorites. The next song was "Skating Away" - another one of my favorites. If I had to narrow it down to two songs that I'd want to hear, those would be them. He also played, "Fat Man," "Christmas Song," "Cheap Day Return," "Mother Goose," an excerpt from "Thick as a Brick," and several of his own songs. And a jazzy version of "Locomotive Breath."

One audience member asked Ian about his voice. He had surgery for polyps, back in the mid-eighties, and his voice hasn't been the same since. I've thought it's been improving, slightly, and Ian confirmed that. He explained that the throat muscles are used quite differently for singing than they are for playing the flute, and that is quite hard on his voice. When he is recording, he won't even sing and play the flute on the same days. He has no such luxury when he is touring, though.

An answer to another question dealt with his desire to be a policeman, which was sidetracked by his budding musical career.

Ian once injured his wrist, and it still bothers him sometimes. Because of this old injury, handshakes can cause him pain that can linger for a while, so he has taken up the elbow rub as his form of greeting - hence the name of the tour. It did sometimes look like a square dance step, though.

Another thing Ian is doing on this tour, is inviting local musicians to play. Daryl Stuermer and Willy Porter played songs. Steurmer plays with Genesis on tour, and with Phil Collins both on tour and in the studio. He is good. Just a little dull (like he's learned too much from Phil Collins) but very good nonetheless. His song featured the lone electric guitar for the evening. Willy Porter has toured with Tull (and has played with Tori Amos), and Ian plays on a song on his latest record. They played that one. It was just Willy and Ian. Willy is an amazing acoustic guitarist, but he also has an awesome voice, and is a great songwriter.

The intimate setting seemed to give certain loud people the idea that they could shout anything they wanted and Ian and the whole audience would hear, and enjoy their humor. If it were a loud rock concert, they would hardly be heard, and I could have ignored them easily, but it wasn't and I couldn't. And there was an embarrassing episode near the end of the first half, that involved a pushy local "celebrity" who changed the focus of the show from Ian to himself for about ten minutes. And through the whole second half, someone was breathing on me. It was not pleasant. All of that almost ruined the show for me.

The show got a bit rushed at he end, as they ran out of time. The conversation ended up taking more time than they expected, I'd guess, and it was the first show of the tour, and they had a lot of bugs to work out, and things to refine. I would recommend the show, highly, to any hardcore Tull fan.

"After 35 years of being THE flute player in rock music to a lot of people," Anderson said, "I have to regard it as personal failure that it has not inspired hundreds of others."

Setlist: Largely conversation, but the musical component was:
In The Grip Of Stronger Stuff (live flute over pre-recorded backing), Life Is A Long Song, Skating Away..., Thick As A Brick (~3 mins), Up The 'Pool, Cheap Day Return, Mother Goose, Fat Man, Griminelli's Lament, Montserrat, Bourée - [Interval] - A Christmas Song, Boris Dancing, Daryl Steurmer song (w. Ian), Circular Breathing, Big Yellow Pine (Willy Porter w. Ian), Dot Com, Living In The Past, Locomotive Breath

The Femmes did an acoustic mini tour of Wisconsin. It was five or six dates around the state. They ended it up in Milwaukee on Halloween at the Pabst Theater. I had heard it was going to be an acoustic tour, and wondered how that would be. Would it rock less? How different would it sound? Which songs wouldn't they be able to do? Well... no, not very and few.

I'm sure there were a few songs they decided that wouldn't work very well as acoustic, but they normally vary their set enough that you wouldn't notice an absences. And they played their songs with the same vigor as any other show. They did play one song that I would not have expected to hear - "Gimme the Car". That one has a very electric feel, on record.

I don't know the exact setlist, but the live album has the following songs:
1. "Prove My Love"
2. "I'm Nothing"
3. "Country Death Song"
4. "Blister in the Sun"
5. "Gimme the Car"
6. "Don't Talk About My Music"
7. "Confessions"
8. "Hallowed Ground"
9. "Life Is an Adventure"
10. "Old Mother Reagan"
11. "Ugly"
12. "Good Feeling"
13. "Dahmer Is Dead"
14. "American Music"
15. "Special"
16. "Sweet Worlds of Angels"
17. "Black Girls"
18. "Gone Daddy Gone"
19. "Add It Up"
20. "Kiss Off"

They didn't play all these songs at our show, and we (Phil and I, among a couple thousand others) heard a few others. They played Michael Hurley's song, "The Werewolf", and it was the first time I'd heard the Femmes do "Positively 4th Street". I was very happy to hear "Sweet Worlds of Angels". It may have been the only time I ever heard them do it. It's one of my favorites, and (along with "Dahmer is Dead") is from their relatively obscure Rock!!!!!.

Brian Ritchie opened the show under pseudonym and mask (basket), as shakuhachi player, Tairaku.

( an aside )