Rusty Shackleford

Does anyone have the venue presale password for Lincoln Theatre tomorrow?  I'm on the 9:30/IMP email list but didn't get anything about it.

Shut out of presale for Lincoln. But not crazy about GA seating. That was the setup last time and it was kind of a pain. The venue does some shows with assigned seating, not sure why this show isn't. It's going to sell out either way.

More re-issues on the way this summer: Sound of Lies, Smile, and Rainy Day Music.

http://www.startribune.com/entertainment/blogs/251086991.html

No word on what the bonus material will be, but looking forward to these.

Just picked up the New Mendicants LP.  Great stuff.  They just announced a few tour dates in the US as well.

Fun fact: they recorded Man-Made in Chicago, and in the liner notes they thank Wilco for the loan of a guitar.

I love these guys.  Agree with others above that Songs from Northern Britain and Grand Prix are their best records, but they haven't made a bad one.

Rumor has it they're working on a new album and will tour again later this year.

Otis just posted another Henneman interview, so there's a total of three up now.  The last one talks about how Tony Margherita got Brian a record deal, the Bottle Rockets' rapid rise to brief stardom, and what it's like to go on stage after Anthrax.

All worth checking out.

Brian Henneman appeared on Otis Gibbs' podcast again this week.  

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/thanks-for-giving-a-damn/id568743610?mt=2

He talks about the Coffee Creek shows, meeting Bun E. Carlos, and singing the last song Uncle Tupelo ever performed.  

R.E.M. Accelerate.  It gave me a headache the first time through.  There was no second time through.  The songs sounded okay live, but the CD was just awful.

The question I ask myself is, if my favorite bands were playing two nearby venues the same night, same time, which one would I pick to see? I've had show conflicts for sure but not at the top level. So here's my order in that case.

 

1. Pearl Jam

2. Soul Asylum

3. Wilco

4. Old 97s

or maybe Wilco 3A and Old 97s 3B to be determined by coin-toss.

I like this method, too, and I might have the Old 97s be my number one as well, if only because the last two times I had tickets to see them (both "Too Far to Care" album shows!) I had to miss out for family reasons.  They kick ass live, and most of their records are good-to-great, but they have a few forgettable ones in the catalog.

That said, Wilco is my favorite band.  I like all the albums (though some are better than others), and there are very few dud songs.  I could say the same thing about the Beatles, but I never saw the Beatles live, and I've never experienced a "new" Beatles record, so I'll never have the same relationship with them that I have with Wilco.

I don't know if I want to buy it for a third time or not. I have all those bonus tracks. I suppose if I buy this one, it will be for the liner notes and improved sound quality of the bonus tracks.

Same here.  Those better be some damn fine liner notes. 

Might as well post this here.

Bottle Rockets are re-releasing the first two albums, including the debut which has been out of print for about 20 years, with tons of bonus material.  Tweedy and Farrar make an appearance.

 http://www.spin.com/articles/bottle-rockets-indianapolis-uncle-tupelo-stream-reissue-demo/

I'm pretty psyched for this, even though many of the demos have been floating around for awhile.  I'd buy this just to get a legit copy of the first record and 40 pages of liner notes.

I think they read the requests but there are so many that it ends up not making a difference unless there's a real campaign.  At Wolf Trap in 2009 Jeff mentioned that "How to Fight Loneliness" was a request, and they played it.  Someone on here had started a campaign for it.  "Thirty-six of you are going to be really happy," Jeff said before playing it.

Totally.  I saw Jeff solo at the Lincoln Theatre, and he played it there, but it's just not the same with one guitar. 

That was the third time I've seen Wilco at Merriweather, and for my money, the best time!  Even in spite of a shorter set (and in spite of the fact that Muzzle of Bees continues to elude me).

 

Someone above described the second half as "blistering," and this is a perfect description.  They were just on fire.  I had the fun of having a first-timer with me, and she was totally blown away.  Always great to witness someone experiencing the magic for the first time.  I've never been to a show where they closed with The Lonely 1, and I was amazed at how utterly rapt the audience became.  We were clearly all mesmerized.  A great, great show!

Funny thing.  This was my third time for Wilco at Merriweather as well, and I keep requesting Muzzle of Bees to no avail.

If I'd noticed the typo I might have bought one of these just for the conversation piece value.

Terrific show by Wilco.  The pace, especially the back half of the set, can only be described as blistering.  16 songs in about 75 minutes (7:40 to 8:55 or so).  I thought they might end on "A Shot in the Arm," with the crowd going wild, but they dialed it way back for the closer, which was awesome.

I was a bit disappointed not to see any of the covers or collaborations that have appeared at other shows (with the exception of Ryan Bingham sitting in with MMJ for one song), but Wilco really brought it last night before a packed house.  Even during Bingham's set the pit was relatively full, and the pavilion was filling in during MMJ.  The pit cleared out pretty good after MMJ, so I got a good spot up close for Wilco, and by the time their set was done the whole place looked packed, even out on the lawn.  Good to see, and somewhat surprising given the reports from earlier shows and apparently slow sales at Merriweather until recently (just judging from the number of promo reminders that kept going out).

Ryan Bingham was good, with a rockin band complete with fiddle.  If you like his records, you'll love his show.  MMJ was fine, but not really my thing, as it turns out.  I found them sort of monotonous: enjoyable enough, but not all that dynamic.  Dylan and his band were much better than I'd expected from reading some earlier reviews.  Dylan sounds pretty good considering his age and the fact that he's Dylan.  Couldn't understand most of the words to most of the songs (even the half or so of them that I knew), but his phrasing and inflection were plenty musical--he's definitely not phoning it in up there.  Loved the standup bass in his band.

One thing that was weird compared to the average Wilco show is I don't think I've ever seen 5 hours of music with so little banter.  Bingham, MMJ, and Wilco each thanked the crowd for coming out, and Jeff once said that "we love this place," but that was it.  I don't think Dylan ever verbally acknowledged the crowd, although he did bring the band up front for two ovations.  All 4 acts crammed about as much music as they could between a 5:10 starting time and an 11 pm curfew.

Also, one correction to the set list posted by BeShakey above: Dylan closed with Ballad of a Thin Man, not Blowin in the Wind.

Thanks for posting.  I find the whole music business fascinating, but details like these are hard to come by.

They say they're moving it because of recent (and possible future) rain, which has softened the grounds.  But I wonder if they've also had soft ticket sales, which seem to be the case elsewhere.  IMP (the promoter for the Merriweather show) keeps hyping the upcoming show, and from what I can tell, plenty of tickets are still available.

It's a strange business where the Rolling Stones can sell out (?) at $600 a seat, but Bob Dylan, Wilco, and MMJ can't do it at $90.

Maybe a stupid question, but did they play "Red Eyed and Blue," or just go straight into "I Got You"?

I can't make it to this show, but I'd like someone to benefit from my misfortune.  The Old 97's will be playing "Too Far to Care" plus other stuff at the Brooklyn Bowl this Saturday.  I'll drop the ticket in the mail today for the first person to PM me.  Thanks.

First time I saw Wilco they opened with A Shot in the Arm.  Still my favorite opener.

Maybe we already knew this, but according to the 9:30 Club's blast email this week, Wilco will play a "full set" at the Americanarama shows.

I went ahead and bought a pit ticket for Merriweather, which are apparently still available on a will-call-only basis.  

Didn't get to many shows this year.  The one I really missed out on was the Old 97's Too Far to Care tour, which coincided with a family emergency.  At least the ones I saw were all quite good.

1.  Neil Young and Crazy Horse at the Patriot Center.  My first time seeing Neil, and Patti Smith opened.  Great shows both.

2.  Bottle Rockets living room show.  Awesome being up close to a great band and hearing them reinvent rock songs acoustically.  It's unfortunate that they don't have a wider following, but the upside for fans is that we get to see them in these intimate settings.

3.  Wilco at Wolf Trap, night 2.  Much better than their 2009 show at the same venue, and Lee Ranaldo was very good as an opener.

4.  Beach Boys at Merriweather.  Those old songs still get me, and I'm glad I got to see Brian Wilson perform them. The show was good enough that I might try to take my kids next time the band comes around, even without Brian and Al. 

Looking thru old setlists of shows I went to. I swear 06 and 07 were some great Wilco years!

 

Wilco

2007-06-21

Merriweather Post Pavilion

Columbia, MD

 

This was my first Wilco show, and it was awesome, from the "Shot in the Arm" opener to the curfew-beating 3rd encore.  I was in the pit, and you could tell that they changed up the 2nd encore a bit to shove an extra song or two in there, so it was already a great show.  Then when the crowd kept up the noise, we got an apparently spontaneous 3rd encore, which is pretty rare these days.  This show is right up there with the "Evening With" and post-residency shows for me.

This could be a very good thing. I hope they release some shows that never surfaced on DIME or etree, like the 2010 show at Strathmore.