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There are few things more quintessentially Midwestern, probably, than a day and night spent at Summerfest in Milwaukee. I don't think I fully appreciated it the first few times I went, but where else can you get a combination of state fair, music festival and Oktoberfest, all contained within a lovely setting on the shores of Lake Michigan? When the weather is super nice, the bass is positively thumping and you've got a basket of fried cheese curds and dish of blue moon ice cream in your hands, well, let's just say that for some people, this is about as close as it gets to heaven.

 

(Not to mention the fact that if you play your cards right, you can get in for a few boxes of tampons or a small collection of shampoos, conditioners and lotions and then somehow win a putt-putt mini-golf contest for passes that will get you and your companion front-row access in the VIP pit section and several free drinks each, but that's another story. )

 

After all that, who even needs to see a quintessentially Midwestern band play a 90-minute set of some of their greatest hits, right? Nah. Despite enduring the Zac Brown Band hordes headed to the biggest stage to see the day's headliners, more than a few of us planted ourselves at the Miller Lite Oasis stage to see Wilco make its long-awaited return to Summerfest. It's almost hard to believe that after the band had played a Summerfest gig five times between 1996 and 2006, including one briefly documented in the I Am Trying To Break Your Heart documentary, this was the first time Jeff and Co. had been back in 15 years.

 

The good news was that, in some ways, it was as if barely any time had passed since the last time the band had performed at the Henry Maier Festival Park. Jeff and his bandmates made the most of their 90-minute time slot, deciding spontaneously to not even leave the stage for an encore break after I'm Always In Love, though Jeff said (as he usually does) that marked the end of their regular set. We didn't even get some of the usual antics that were part of the recently concluded It's Time tour with Sleater-Kinney and Nnamdi, such as the "The End"-style prelude to Heavy Metal Drummer. But instead, Jeff simply appeared to be soaking in the good vibes from a beautiful evening and a joyous audience that was undoubtedly also indulging in some, er, chemical substances (and I don't mean the blue moon ice cream).

 

"It's so lovely to be here with you," Jeff said at one point late in the show. "People are kissing, people are smiling, people are drinking. I smell weed, I think." After being told that the latter was still technically illegal in relatively conservative Wisconsin, Jeff proclaimed that to be "bullshit," and then made a joke about possibly getting arrested due to the crowd's cannabis consumption.

 

Of course, with those sorts of shenanigans, plus the general setup of the venue, you also get a sense of being in a carnival-like atmosphere of which whatever you happen to be seeing/watching/doing is just one small part. So, for example, you often hear sound bleeding over from other stages — there are at least 10 music stages, as well as other exhibitions such as sports-related demonstrations, going on simultaneously — and just the sounds of other activities going on constantly.

 

Jeff even joked about it a couple of times, at one point looking in the direction of the next stage over, hearing the thumping emanating from it and saying, "We're gonna play a waltz against that." A few songs later, before playing one of the quietest songs in their set (If I Ever Was A Child), he said that they really should have coordinated their ballads with the act playing on the next stage. Then again, given the power of the sound system on their own stage — which those of us toward the front felt in our chests in a punishing way during most of previous act Trapper Schoepp's set as well as, for example, during the down beats on Art Of Almost — maybe the other stages were hearing some of the bass thump from the Miller Lite Oasis stage as well. There's nothing else that makes you feel like you're at a giant music festival more than, I suppose, enduring the massive reverberations from competing stacks of subwoofers.

 

Anyway, other visits to Banter Corner included a bit where Jeff mentioned looking out and seeing these "flame things" suspended above the audience that reminded him of the torch-like devices that Bob Dylan had used as part of his stage design when the two toured together. "We can't afford something like that," Jeff quipped, looking over at Pat, who nodded in agreement. And late in the set, Jeff also acknowledged in a way, the imminent 20th anniversary of 9/11 (and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, in a way) when he noted prior to Heavy Metal Drummer that it was a song off an album that "was originally supposed to come out 20 years ago tomorrow," but obviously didn't and then came out seven days later for free on the Internet.

 

I could go on about more of the festival food (have I mentioned blue moon ice cream?) or the ski lift-like Sky Glider tram that you can ride over most the festival grounds (underrated!) or the ridiculousness of winning a VIP wristband via a mini-golf putting contest (you could play as many times as you wanted until you "won," lol), but I think you probably get the idea about Summerfest. It was nice to see more than a few familiar faces come out, and certainly it was a memorable day in more ways than one.

 

Here was the complete setlist, as played (didn't see a printed list, so can't say if there were any changes/omissions):

 

A Shot In The Arm

Random Name Generator

At Least That's What You Said

One Wing

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Hummingbird

Everyone Hides

Box Full Of Letters

Dawned On Me

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm The Man Who Loves You

I'm Always In Love

The Late Greats

California Stars

On 9/2/2021 at 7:51 AM, calvino said:

 

That's why that frog was probably a god-send for you at that one show --- 'woo-hoo, finally something really unique to write about'...

 

I do appreciate your write-ups.

 

Thank you kindly, sir! Animal invasions, or other distractions, are always welcome as recap fodder in my book.

On 9/1/2021 at 4:28 AM, Albert Tatlock said:

Ta.

There's that Goth/Joy Division version of HMD. Is this version like that?

Also. How is Pat Watch? He went through that spell of not being very engaged. The novelty of performing again means there is no sign of that?

 

Apologies, dear Tatlock! Been on a road trip and just saw your post. To answer your inquiries, I had totally forgotten that goth version of HMD (though I prefer to go more with Bauhaus than JD, but anyway)! This version is decidedly not like that at all. This one really is a The End-esque rendition, where Jeff starts speaking the lyrics like the Lizard King himself whilst the band fill in some downcast psychedelic sounds behind him. My only regret is they don't do the whole song that way, but rather then launch into the "regular" version — albeit with Glenn playing the natural intro rather than using the sample (which might be retired for good?)

 

And as far as Pat, he seemed to be engaged just fine throughout though I heard through the sosh medes that he is dealing with some hand/finger issue that I hope he is able to get fixed or at least helped before the next run of shows...

5 hours ago, tinnitus photography said:

a few orders of magnitude higher, even.

how many times have you seen them play, at least a few hundred at this point no?

People always ask, but I honestly don’t keep a count. Not really a stats guy that way, plus what do you count — just full-band Wilco, or Jeff solo or Tweedy band or ? Anyway, maybe I’ll do it when I write the book! 

5 hours ago, tinnitus photography said:

Thanks Paul!

I do find it a bit of a challenge to review shows of a band I've seen so many times and keep the review fresh.

Oh, I can relate! 

Little frog in front of John. 🐸 

 

After seeing Wilco wrap up several weeks of touring with Sleater-Kinney and Nnamdi with a big hometown show in Chicago on Saturday night, I have to admit it felt a little weird to be watching them close out a small festival in Columbus, Ohio, just 24 hours later. But such is life for a working band, I suppose: You go where the next gig is, regardless of any narratives or odd routings or other potential challenges.

 

And of course there were bound to be some challenges, given everything that's happened this month as the band has returned to the road. In the Midwest in the summer, weather always looms as an obstacle to be overcome for outdoor events. For example, your humble correspondent heard that a surprise downpour early in the day nearly proved catastrophic for parts of Nels' rig. Then as other bands on stage before Wilco were performing (Black Pumas, St. Paul and the Broken Bones), we could see stage crew in the background scrambling to pull out tarps and cover up equipment with plastic in anticipation of more approaching storms. Even midway through Wilco's set, Jeff looked out from the stage at one point, spotted lightning and seemed almost gleeful that it was far enough off in the distance that "I think we're gonna get this in."

 

Given all that, the band's headlining set on the second and final day of the Wonderbus Festival was a nice coda to this first run of shows following one of the biggest challenges most of us have faced in our lifetimes. Not that the 92-minute set was vastly different from the others the band has played this month — though we did get the relatively rare occurrence of both Side With The Seeds and You Are My Face in the same show — but it did showcase a group of musicians who still seem to enjoy playing music together after all this time especially in front of a receptive audience that still features people seeing the band for the first time.

 

As far as Banter Corner, I can't even accurately recap all of Jeff's visits on this night. He was in festival crowd mode, for sure. After a small beach ball landed in the photographer's pit between the barricade and the front of the stage, Jeff jokingly mentioned how he wished someone would come down and throw the beach balls back into the crowd because they helped the band's performance. No one did at first, which was even funnier — "No one's gonna help us out? OK, good talk." — but eventually some one came down and did the deed. He also had fun at various points with people yelling out various requests ("We have a program.") and someone who I'm not sure if they just looked like they wanted to yell something, but before Box Full Of Letters, Jeff said they were going to play a song off their first album and he pointed at the guy and asked if he knew what it was and the guy just let out a big "Casino Queen!" that caused Glenn to crack up. (Even more amusing, it turned out that Jeff maybe was actually just asking if the guy knew the name of the album.)

 

One other noteworthy bit of banter came after Hummingbird, when some guy near the front decided to yell out something that sounded like "Dad jeans!" Which Jeff looked very confused by at first, and apparently thought the guy was saying, "Dank jeans." Then he just sort of shook his head and quipped to the crowd, "You haven't been out in a while. We expected some of this aberrant behavior as you readjust to entering society."

 

It wasn't a perfect performance by any means — Nels, for example, had a little bit of a rough start to his solo on Impossible Germany, perhaps owing to some of the issues with his pedalboard from the aforementioned weather issues earlier — but better than I might have expected for the kind of gig where I imagine it would have been pretty easy to be a bit distracted coming off the hometown finale show the night before. I mean, I know Jeff and his bandmates are (total) pros and have experienced that scenario before, but they are also human and I'm sure that playing the show they did the previous night with a lot of family and friends in the audience, not to mention saying goodbye to folks you've been seeing for weeks, etc., and the vibe of a festival crowd and the various shenanigans therein can make it somewhat tough to focus.

 

Speaking of potential distractions, it didn't seem like any of the band members noticed a tiny little frog that somehow made its way onto the lip of the stage midway through the show and just kind of hung out for a while, gradually hopping down the line from in front of Jeff to all the way down by Pat, but those of us relatively close to the front did. I just had to mention that little guy, though, because he was the chillest festival frog I've seen maybe ever.

 

That frog was almost as cool as "The End" spoken-word introduction to Heavy Metal Drummer that Jeff and band are really beginning to perfect. Now if only they'd do the entire song that way, at least once! Unfortunately by that point in the set, we know it's getting close to the end. And as always with a 90-minute time slot, there's a sense that time is running out — Jeff even seemed to go around and tell his bandmates before I'm Always In Love that they weren't even going to go off stage for the usual encore break in an attempt to squeeze one more song into the show.

 

Anyway, Wonderbus might have been a bit of a coda for this run of touring but it was a pretty fun, memorable — and did I mention, super humid? — coda in more ways than one. It was nice to see and actually get a chance to talk to a few familiar faces throughout the course of the day. And kudos, as always, to the Wilcrew, who always go above and beyond for our benefit and definitely deserve a few days of rest after this crazy month. Here's to a bit of a break and then we'll see what the future has in store for us during these pandemic times.

 

This was the complete Wilco setlist, as played (California Stars was scratched out in favor of Outtasite (Outta Mind) on the printed list as the final song):

 

A Shot In The Arm

Random Name Generator

Side With The Seeds

Via Chicago

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Hummingbird

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

You Are My Face

Box Full Of Letters

Everyone Hides

Dawned On Me

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

I'm The Man Who Loves You

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm Always In Love

The Late Greats

Outtasite (Outta Mind)

13 hours ago, nalafej said:

 

Agree.

 

I mean, a track with Glenn, Spencer and Andy Shauf (today's release) deserves compensation.

 

I'm so delighted to see that Andy and Jeff collaborated on this.

 

Jeff played this song at least once on the Tweedy Show, and I dug it! I think he mentioned that Andy was just over for lunch on one of his visits to the Loft and they just decided to record this one with him playing clarinet. Glad it's getting a release of some sort.

Well I guess, for the most part, all's well that ends well for the It's Time tour. All bands get to play their full sets, unencumbered by the weather? Check. One more on-stage collaboration between co-headliners Wilco and Sleater-Kinney? Check. Wilco not feeling like it had to play all the hits every single night? Check. Jeff finally taking a page from Carrie Brownstein and inviting fans up to the front to provide the show with a jolt of energy? Check.

 

Since the show was being live-streamed again, most of the people who would care enough to read this can probably judge for themselves and don't need my ramblings (though someone told me that the stream didn't have the crowd noise in the mix at all, which is kind of weird). But anyway, if you want to know my opinion, then read on...

 

I'm sure I've discussed and debated the fallacy of the hometown show both here and in private conversations in the past. Basically, this is the idea that we should expect something extra special when a band plays a show in its hometown. This usually happens when a lot of folks from out of town travel to said hometown for one or more shows under the premise that "I need to see [insert band here] on their home turf," and something amazing will ensue. Sometimes it does, but it can't always be truly spectacular, right? As far as Chicago shows by Wilco go, I'd place this Jay Pritzker Pavilion one squarely in the middle.

 

The Pritzker is a beautiful, picturesque venue right in downtown Chicago and has a really good sound system, so I totally understand why Wilco would conclude a summer tour of amphitheater-type venues there. Then again, I know a lot of people feel like it's not the greatest venue for a capital-R rock concert, especially if you don't have a seat within the first 20 or so rows (and even then, you can have litchurally one of the tallest people in the joint come in just before Wilco starts, leave before the band is done and, in between, affect your view of the proceedings the way the moon blocks out the sun during an eclipse, but I digress). Also, in my experience, it attracts a lot of people who maybe aren't the most dedicated music fans the same way a place like the Chicago Theatre does. Maybe that's just inevitable when you get to venues that size, that a greater proportion of the audience is made up of more casual types, but I know that's also annoyed some people I've talked to over the years.

 

Certainly you couldn't describe as casual the relatively small but dedicated bunch of Sleater-Kinney fans who gladly took up Brownstein's suggestion early in that band's set that they should come stand down front and fill the empty space between the stage and the front row of seats and part of the aisles. It's something she has done at many of the relatively soulless, seated, shed-type venues on this tour and results in what I've come to call "the Sleater-Kinney surge" every night. It's a pretty punk rock move that clearly some of the venue's security guards haven't been entirely prepared for (and probably aren't all that thrilled with). But there's no doubt that it gives the S-K set a certain amount of energy that would otherwise be lacking, and it's hard not to admire at least a little bit.

 

Unfortunately, what typically happens is after the Sleater-Kinney surge is that the security staff and venue personnel are more aware that something like that could happen and so by the time Wilco's set comes around, it's back to keeping the aisles clear and enforcing everyone's seats all that and so Wilco ends up feeling kind of like the fuddy-duddy old elder statesmen/dad rockers. Fortunately at the Pritzker show Jeff finally took a page from his friend's book and invited anyone who wanted to come down front for the show-closing Outtasite (Outta Mind). That's sort of when the Wilco set finally felt like the rock show we all know and love (well, most of us know and love, I guess).

 

"Oh man, we missed you," Jeff told the audience relatively early on, gesturing toward the both the gathered masses, the stage and Nels Cline following the fiery freakout at the end of Art Of Almost, and he could have been speaking about any number of moments throughout the show. "We missed this. We missed that."

 

As for the set itself, it was nice to get a reprise of the sporadic Wilco/S-K collaborations we've gotten on this tour. It hasn't happened as often as I may have thought, but at least we got to see Jeff and his bandmates with Brownstein and Corin Tucker one more time for the set-opening A Shot In The Arm. That's obviously the most fitting song for the two acts to join forces on, since that's the song Sleater-Kinney covered for the tour-only split single, but since it's the first song of Wilco's set, it is a slightly awkward moment when the two women leave the stage because there's no time for sentimentalities, or even Jeff to say directly to them that it's been nice to tour together or whatever. Tonight, for instance, you looked up after the song and both were already gone and the Wilco set continued apace.

 

Inevitably with the 90-minute slot and a hard 10 p.m. curfew, time was going to become an issue and once again, it always feels to me like just when Wilco start to get warmed up, we reach that part of the set that starts the inevitable conclusion with Jesus, etc., Theologians, I'm The Man Who Loves You and Heavy Metal Drummer and then it's basically time for one or two quick encore songs and then the show is over. At least the band got out of its usual lane somewhat by swapping out I Am Trying To Break Your Heart for Via Chicago early on and not feeling compelled to conclude with California Stars (though perhaps that was more a function of the ticking clock than anything else).

 

"We're running out of time," Jeff said to the predictable dismay of the audience with about 15 minutes to go before the curfew. "We live here. We'll be back."

 

Banter Corner was a bit more fruitful than it has been at other points on the tour, so perhaps that accounted for some of the rush at the end as well. At one point, in effusively thanking the crews and support staff who have helped keep the tour going despite all of its challenges, he mentioned how his amp "blew up at 2 p.m. today" and got fixed in time for the show that night — though were you thinking, like I was, that he probably had 10 more amps like it at The Loft? — and jokingly said that if anyone had an amp that needed fixing, they could leave it at the foot of the stage. Jeff also had a pretty funny bit about the audience electing a spokesman, on account of some guy up front with a loud, projecting voice that kept yelling things, and how he felt like every audience should elect a spokesperson. And there was an interesting little tidbit about how he wrote Born Alone because his mother had told him "we're born alone and we die alone" and he wanted to remind himself that she was wrong.

 

Well, I've already gone on longer than I typically do so I'll wrap it up here. But I'm sure more than a few other folks on here were at the show and I hope at least some people will chime in. Was it a perfect show? My sources say no. Could I have done without the mugginess? Without a doubt. Did it feel like a tour finale? Reply hazy, try again. Was it nice to see Jeff and his bandmates back home? It is decidedly so.

 

Here was the complete Wilco setlist, as played (didn't get a look at the printed list, so can't say if there were changes/omissions):

A Shot In The Arm (with Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker on backing vocals)

Random Name Generator

At Least That's What You Said

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

Via Chicago

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Hummingbird

Box Full Of Letters

Everyone Hides

Born Alone

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

I'm The Man Who Loves You

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm Always In Love

-----------------------------------------------

The Late Greats

Outtasite (Outta Mind)

 

And for anyone who cares, here was the complete Sleater-Kinney setlist as played:

High In The Grass

Hurry On Home

Price Tag

Down The Line

Jumpers

Shadow Town

Can I Go On

What's Mine Is Yours

Path Of Wellness

A New Wave

Complex Female Characters

Surface Envy

Modern Girl

Bring Mercy

The Fox

Worry With You

One Beat (with Fred Armisen on tambourine)>

Entertain

16 hours ago, tinnitus photography said:

my review:
https://digboston.com/fotobom-wilco-and-sleater-kinney-at-leader-bank-pavilion/

photos are embedded in the review w/ a link but if you're just a visual person you can find the galleries here:
https://www.tinnitus-photography.com/concerts2021

 

Good writing, Tim! Enjoyed reading your take. It's interesting to write stuff on here versus for a more "general" audience. I find that it sometimes goes against my journalistic instinct a bit because I'm not explaining some things or assuming a certain level of knowledge.

1 hour ago, NoOneKnowsMe said:

This was my 20th Wilco show and first this year, driving with a friend from Cleveland to upstate New York to catch it. The band was energetic and seemed to be happy to be playing, which apparently seems to be a theme on this tour. Not only due to the COVID-induced break from the road but also because of weather. Frowhat I've read, the band has taken bad weather with them to a lot of their Midwest and East Coast stops. Last night's concert started on time, but a venue staffer told the crowd after NNAMDÏ's set that officials were concerned about lightning.

 

But hey, everyone played! Sleater-Kinney started nearly an hour late and played a shorter set. Wilco got through three songs in the rain (not heavy but it was blowing toward the stage) before Jeff told us that "they're pulling the plug" and that the band would hopefully be back. Luckily they returned after 15 minutes or so and blasted through "Art of Almost."

 

I'm sure others will post observations about how shows are the same/different than others on the tour. For me, while I always want some more variety in the setlists, I thought the band sounded great and were energetic. Perhaps more than the past few shows I've seen. As I said, I think just being able to play was big, given the uncertainty with weather. Jeff was moving around more and visually interacting with the band a lot, and was even nice enough to give Nels a shoulder massage as the guitar maven closed out "Hummingbird."

 

Hey, thanks for the report! Seems like this was another of the slightly cursed shows on this slightly cursed tour...BUT at least you got (almost) a full Wilco set! That sucks about Sleater-Kinney, though. This wasn't the first time they've kind of taken one for the team as the middle act on the bill. You feel bad for their fans, or anyone who was really looking forward to seeing them.

6 hours ago, tinnitus photography said:

just curious... for those at/near the rail, did the venue allow photographers in the security pit area last night?

 

I noticed during S-K's set that there oddly weren't any photographers and actually, now that I think of it, I don't really remember any during Wilco's set either. Why? Has that been an issue there in the past?

Hey, did you know it was Jeff's birthday at this show in Maine? From all the social media messages throughout the day to Carrie Brownstein mentioning it during Sleater-Kinney's set to the crowd trying to sing "Happy Birthday" before the first two songs of Wilco's set — forcing Jeff to stop and restart Random Name Generator — it seemed like there was some anticipation that something out of the ordinary might happen. The presentation of a lobster cake, maybe? An on-stage Moxie toast, perhaps? As it turned out, there was nothing nearly that dramatic (unless you count the drunken lady in the second row who sneaked in just before Wilco started and then kept losing her balance and falling over repeatedly during the early part of the show).

 

I was going to say that we were able to give Jeff the "gift" of letting him play whatever songs he wanted and not even complaining a little bit, but then I remembered there was apparently someone who kept requesting a rarity from A.M., to the brief annoyance of the birthday boy. "That's a deep cut," Jeff snapped about halfway through Wilco's 93- minute set. "It's my birthday and we're not gonna play it, so you can shut up." Then, in classic Jeff fashion a second later: "I'm sorry." I couldn't even hear what the request was, but a couple of songs later before playing Box Full Of Letters, Jeff tried to offer some small consolation to the requester by saying that the song they were about to play was at least from the same album as the request. "Hopefully my rude comment didn't make him leave," Jeff said.

 

That was one of several bits of birthday-related banter we got throughout the course of the evening. Before If I Ever Was A Child, Jeff said, "I want to sing this song to myself." And making his usual comment about the garishness of Nels' white double-neck, Jerry Jones guitar before Dawned On Me, Jeff quipped, "That guitar is made of my birthday cake." He also made a joke about it being "my first birthday in 18 months," recommended performing before a crowd of people as a good way to spend one's birthday ("I'm an advocate") and thanked the crowd "for spending my birthday with me...2000 of my closest friends."

 

Certainly there could have been worse places to spend a birthday, I guess. Following a successful debut with Big Thief at Thompson's Point in 2017, this was Wilco's long-awaited return to the picturesque piece of land overlooking the Fore River. The weather was generally quite lovely, though it seemingly got muggier and muggier as the night wore on. I'm not sure whether that had more to do with people packing in closer and closer as Wilco got closer to taking the stage, but certainly one of those Big Ass Fans or a giant A/C unit would have been pretty welcome by the end.

 

As for Wilco's performance, hey did you know this was Jeff's birthday? According to a cursory search, I can only find three total times in its history that the full band has played a show on Jeff's birthday and only one other time this century (at the Troxy in London in 2009, for the record). I seem to recall there being a cake brought out at that London gig, but perhaps our resident Tatlock can share his memories of that night. What a random place that was for the band to play, wasn't it? About the only think I recall is taking a shared-ride car to get back to where I was staying before ridesharing was even a thing. But I digress...

 

Twelve years, four albums and one global pandemic later, there wasn't any cake in Portland — at least not on stage — but there was a certain amount of goofiness as the set wore on toward its inevitable conclusion. Starting with Hummingbird, when Jeff did some extra, uh, stretching/posing/grimacing before he started singing and also accentuated some of the silly moves he's been known to do during that song in particular, to the The End-style spoken-word bit preceding Heavy Metal Drummer that has been a source of amusement for all of the band members during this run, it just seemed to me like everyone was a little looser than they have been — perhaps on account of Jeff's birthday or just because the tour is winding down.

 

Even at the very end of the show-closing Outtasite (Outta Mind), John and Glenn had a bit of a moment when John was trying to time his final rock 'n' roll leap to the last down beat of Glenn's drum stroke and they were just a tiny bit off. Maybe you had to be there, but it was kind of funny — at least to me. As with the rest of the set, there were more than a few smiles to go around. Happy 54th birthday, Jeff! Let's celebrate — or not — in another 12 years! #OyVey

 

Here was the complete Wilco setlist, as played (didn’t get a look at the printed list, so can’t speak to any omissions/changes but I’m fairly certain they cut California Stars at the end due to time):

A Shot In The Arm

Random Name Generator

At Least That’s What You Said

One Wing

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>
Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Hummingbird

Everyone Hides

Box Full Of Letters

Dawned On Me

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

Heavy Metal Drummer

I’m The Man Who Loves You

I’m Always In Love

—————————————————

The Late Greats

Outtasite (Outta Mind)

 

And for those who care, this was Sleater-Kinney’s complete setlist, as played:

High In The Grass

Hurry On Home

A New Wave

Shadow Town

Jumpers

Price Tag

Tomorrow’s Grave

Can I Go On

Path Of Wellness

Bury Our Friends

Down The Line

Reach Out

Modern Girl

Bring Mercy

The Fox

Worry With You

One Beat>
Entertain

7 hours ago, Madcap said:

Couple of questions for those who have seen shows on this tour - How long has Nnamdi been playing and how efficient has the vaccination card checks been?  We have a dinner reservation at 4:30 (lol) on Saturday and am a little nervous about missing Nnamdi’s set.

Nnamdi’s set has been 30 minutes, give or take. He and his band start right on time or even a minute or three early, so I’d be there by 6 if you want to see them (and it’s definitely worth it, IMHO).

 

Re: the vax checks, it’s varied by venue. Some, like Philly, have seemed a little tighter than normal and other places (St. Louis, Boston) they didn’t even match my vax card and my ID. So as expected, it’s kind of a crapshoot. Who knows how thoroughly they’ll check in Chicago? But it has gone reasonably quickly, in terms of speed. Then again, I’m usually getting there on the early side so when the rush of people going in happens, it might slow down. Hope that helps a little.

 

25 minutes ago, tinnitus photography said:

NNamdi has them in his fanny pack.

 

Thanks for the reminder, Tim! I amended my After The Show post...lol.

4 hours ago, Albert Tatlock said:

An exceptionally well balanced and reasoned report. Also very nicely timed to coincide with my elevenses. Pleased for you that there was a special treat in the encore for some variety.

Ta.

Aww, Tatlock…so kind of you. And happy to give you some reading for your elevenses. 

Lobster rolls for everyone tonight in Maine! Jeff's buying, right?

When it came to what songs Wilco was going to play and how much its setlist would change as the band eased back into touring this month, it became pretty clear pretty quickly that the It's Time tour with Sleater-Kinney and Nnamdi wasn't going to be the second coming of the AmericanaRama run in 2013 when you had little idea what would happen night to night (well, that is, before Bob Dylan took the stage). With a 90-minute time slot most nights on this current tour, Jeff and his bandmates — to some people's chagrin — seem to have settled on a set that appeals to the lowest common denominator and plays well in big amphitheater-type settings.

 

That's not a criticism, at least from this observer, as much as a statement of fact. The only real mysteries for It's Time would be if and how often the two co-headliners would collaborate (yes, and not very often) and what covers, if any, might emerge from said collaboration. The deaths of Tom T. Hall and Don Everly over the past week might have offered opportunities for a tribute of some sort, but when that didn't happen, it seemed as if there just wouldn't be room for much beyond the standard fare.

 

But then came news of the passing of Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts, the heart of a band that has influenced so many musicians over the years, and there was a sneaking suspicion — at least on my part — that this unfortunate event might just be the catalyst for something unique to happen. And so it was that when the members of Wilco re-emerged for their encore (with Pat clutching a cowbell and a drumstick), they had Sleater-Kinney's Corin Tucker with them; together they combined on a fun and welcome version of Honky Tonk Women that suddenly made it a night to remember. "So sad," Jeff said, simply, after the song.

 

Can one song redeem an entire set? I'm not about to go there, although outside of Honky Tonk Women, the Wilco portion of the show was pretty standard tonight. Then again, I have to also remind myself that every night not only are there plenty of folks who are attending their first concert post-lockdown but there are also still people, amazingly, who are seeing Wilco for the first time. (Seriously, I met some Tweedy Show clients who were seeing the band for the first time! Which sort of blows my mind.) So given that, how can we be overly critical of something as minor as song selection? Are there some songs I wish I didn't have to hear for the 1,000th consecutive time? Of course. But do I understand why I'm hearing them and can I still enjoy them? Sure.

 

When you hear mostly the same songs every night for a run of shows, you start to pick up on the tiniest little things — or at least I do. So I'll mention one here that I've noticed of late, which is in Box Full Of Letters, Jeff has been kind of going back on forth on the line in the second verse about having a lot of your records. Sometimes he sings correctly, "Some things that I might like to hear/But I guess I'll give them back," but other times, like tonight, he clearly sings, "Some things that you might like to hear/But I guess I'll give them back," and you're like, 'Hey, wait a minute..." Tonight, I also noticed that he accidentally sang the last "writing this letter to you" line in I'm The Man Who Loves You, which I audibly chuckled at (and people around me were probably thinking, 'What a weirdo.') And amusingly, the "The End"-style spoken-word prelude to Heavy Metal Drummer was back, which I suppose is also a benefit to playing the song so often that you just feel like messing with it sometimes.

 

Jeff's banter was pretty minimal, perhaps owing to another tight 11 p.m. curfew. It seemed like Wilco had barely played 10 songs when Jeff was already saying, "We're running out of time." His only significant comments were thanking people for singing along during Hummingbird and asking, as he does every night, how many people were at their first real concert back after lockdown and saying what an honor it was to be able to play for people experiencing that. [Edit: I forgot to mention that Jeff mentioned Nnamdi's pet lobster — Fred, was it? — that he keeps in his fanny pack, although I forget why. Anyway, I'm sure that about 95 percent of the people had no idea about that comment since they weren't there for the opening set.]

 

One other thing I keep meaning to mention in these little ramblings is that if people hadn't noticed already, and I guess you probably wouldn't unless you were super close to the front for each show, Glenn's drum head for this run basically features a thought bubble that changes every night. Some nights it's got a drawing on it; others, a phrase of some sort. Tonight, in another ode to Charlie Watts and referring to the first documentary about the Rolling Stones made in 1965 and 1966 that was never officially released until 2012, someone had written, "Charlie Is My Darling."

 

What else can I say about this show in Boston? Well, it was a return to the [insert sponsoring bank name here] Pavilion, for one. Is it possible that the band hasn't played there since 2007? Whoa. It's a perfectly decent shed-type venue run by Live Nation that is basically about 5,000 chairs set up on a concrete pavilion under a giant white circus-like tent set on Boston's harborfront. It's not a super-great acoustic venue or anything; I feel like the mix was never completely right, despite the fact I was sitting directly in front of one of the side speaker stacks about 15 rows back. But compared with some of the other sheds on this tour, at least it didn't feel ridiculously cavernous.

 

And I suppose, at least for now in these COVID times, we must commune with live music where we can, where it feels reasonably safe to do so. We're all making certain sacrifices — some more than others...shout out, Wilcrew — to come together and share this experience that, as Jeff and the ladies of Sleater-Kinney have been verbally reminding us each night, we have missed for so long.

 

Here was Wilco's complete setlist, as played (there were no changes/omissions from the printed list):

A Shot In The Arm

Random Name Generator

At Least That's What You Said

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Hummingbird

Box Full Of Letters

Everyone Hides

Born Alone

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

I'm The Man Who Loves You

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm Always In Love

----------------------------------------------

Honky Tonk Women [The Rolling Stones] (w/Corin Tucker on backing vocals)

The Late Greats

California Stars

 

For those few of you following along, here was Sleater-Kinney's complete setlist, as played:

High In The Grass

Hurry On Home

A New Wave

Shadow Town

Jumpers

Price Tag

Path Of Wellness

Can I Go On

What's Mine Is Yours

Bring Mercy

Surface Envy

Tomorrow's Grave

Modern Girl

Reach Out

The Fox

Worry With You

One Beat>

Entertain

57 minutes ago, Passenger Sid said:

 

Wilco fans reading this who were at the KC show 11 days ago, and didn't get to see their favorite band play even ONE song: 

 

(I'm mostly joking. If I had the ability to see the guys for multiple shows, I'd likely quibble about some things as well.)

We quibble because we love? 🤷‍♂️
 

Sorry about KC. I would have liked to have seen that one happen too, since I had a pretty nice spot! 

14 minutes ago, Albert Tatlock said:

Ta.

 

Wonder if they'll be an Everly Brothers cover tonight? Maybe JT could harmonise with John?

No show tonight, first of all. And second, if they didn’t do a Tom T. Hall cover (or even acknowledge his passing), I don’t think there’s a good chance for the Everlys…though I’ve been proven wrong before!

4 hours ago, theashtraysays said:

It's interesting that there are some grumblings over on the Sleater-Kinney FB fan page about how S-K has lost their edge, become "animatronic", not the same without Janet, etc... sound familiar? 

 

1 hour ago, nalafej said:

 

Never been a SK fan and found them pretty animatronic at MPP.

I actually had to look up “animatronic” to make sure it meant what I thought it meant. Like I said, I’m a dummy. But as far as S-K being robotic or robotlike puppets, I don’t see it. Maybe their band, like the dudes in particular, but not Carrie and Corin, IMHO.

OK, who had show 13 (of 17 on this It's Time tour with Nnamdi and Sleater-Kinney) in the "professional show" pool? I kid, I kid...well, sort of.

 

The truth is it's hard for me to write something about a show like this that I feel accurately represents anyone else's experience but my own. I guess you could say that's true for any given show, but especially for this one, I'm struggling to reconcile my opinion with all of the "Great show!" and "Unbelievable!" comments I overheard on the way out or the friend I talked to who said it was his wife's first real show since the onset of the pandemic and she just wanted to hear the hits for the most part. If this was your first show back, or if you hadn't seen Wilco in a long time, or if you just appreciate a consistently solid performance by a band that is almost always consistently solid, then this was a perfect show for you.

 

In that case, please just disregard my dumb commentary and maybe let me take a mulligan. But I just thought that the ingredients were fairly ripe for a professional-type gig that I define as a show that the average attendee would think was perfectly fine — great, even — but that didn't really have anything particularly noteworthy about it. I mean, it was the band's fifth show in five days, playing mostly the same setlist; the type of venue that just doesn't really suit a barn-burner of a performance because it's hard to connect with folks beyond the first few rows; and an audience with more than a few people who probably liked Wilco just fine but were just as happy to enjoy a pleasant summer evening out or who would be just as likely to come to a show with My Morning Jacket...or...The Avett Brothers...or...Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit...or...The National...or...[insert your favorite WXPN act here].

 

And while we're on the subject, can I just take a brief moment to mention something that's sort of been gnawing at me? Which is why does Wilco feel like the fuddy-duddy band on this tour, especially when compared with Sleater-Kinney? I know it's like comparing apples and oranges in some sense, but both bands were formed in the exact same year (1994) and have been at this a long time and achieved a certain amount of success, but it still feels like Sleater-Kinney is your cool disaffected teenager while Wilco is like your slightly unhip uncle or something. Is it just the specific reputations/images each band has developed over the years, or the types of fanbases? Wilco is unquestionably a bigger band — which is why they are playing (slightly) longer and last every night on this tour despite it technically being a co-headlining situation — but Sleater-Kinney and their fans have arguably brought as much or more energy.

 

I mention all of that here because of what happened midway through during Sleater-Kinney's set when Carrie Brownstein basically invited a stage rush, asking the venue staff and security to allow those who wanted to come up front and dance to come into the pit area and into the aisles. That's not even the first time she has done that on this tour, but watching all those mostly younger folks stream down from their seats higher in the pavilion or from the lawn or wherever, I sort of got a little pang of jealousy like, 'Oh, that's a total punk rock move,' and 'That's what a rock show looks like.' Jeff has done that type of thing before, too — not on this tour — but I did wonder if the situations were reversed or if Wilco were essentially opening for a bigger band, would he do it? I just couldn't get past the feeling that maybe Wilco has become the stodgy old elder statesman while Sleater-Kinney are still like the scrappy underdogs — hence my fuddy-duddy comment.

 

At any rate, back to our regularly scheduled programming. In discussing Wilco and Sleater-Kinney, I should note that we did not get a repeat of their joint performance on A Shot In The Arm in Philadelphia as we did in New York the previous night. Which leads me to believe we might only see that once more on this run, possibly during the tour finale in Chicago later this week. It's not exactly the regular collab among tourmates, a la the AmericanaRama tour, that some of us were hoping for when this run got announced, but at least it happened the one time.

 

Wilco's set, aside from the tour debut of One Wing, was pretty much what we've come to expect for now and Jeff and his bandmates have pretty much fine-tuned the songs they seem to want to present on these dates. In some ways, as I suggested earlier, it's a set designed to appeal to the lowest common denominator of Wilco fans and one that generally sounds very good on the powerful sound systems of these shed-type venues they are playing. I mean, if you like electric guitar, how can you not like the shredding done by Jeff and Nels and Pat on songs like Art Of Almost, At Least That's What You Said and Born Alone, right?

 

If Jeff's banter was any indication, though, he probably could use a night off. We didn't get many visits to Banter Corner, with about the longest being to acknowledge that "this has been a wild tour, from broken wrists to hurricanes," and that all of the crews have "kicked so much ass." Earlier, before Everyone Hides, Jeff also took a moment to acknowledge the local crowd, "You've always been so good to us. What an amazing place. Thanks for inviting us. Here's another not-so-joyous song off Ode To Joy." Other comment by Jeff included half-jokingly admiring his own playing on I'm The Man Who Loves You: "That's the best solo I've ever played. Let's hear it for me!" And just before the main set-closing I'm Always In Love, he told the crowd, "We're running out of time," and of course got a reaction, including some boos. "Boo?" Jeff said, shrugging his shoulders in mock disgust. "Ok."

 

Other than that, the show pretty much went as you'd expect it to if you've been following along. We didn't get the spoken-word "The End"-style Heavy Metal Drummer, nor did we apparently get the planned show-closing California Stars (which was on the printed setlist, but wasn't played). So that's the report. Whether you thoroughly enjoyed it or thought it was lacking, remember I'm just one dummy among many, so take all these words with a grain of salt, as I would always hope you would.

 

Here was Wilco's complete setlist, as played (the only change from the printed list was the aforementioned omission of California Stars):

A Shot In The Arm

Random Name Generator

Before Us

One Wing

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

Box Full Of Letters

Everyone Hides

Born Alone

At Least That's What You Said

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

I'm The Man Who Loves You

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm Always In Love

---------------------------------------------

The Late Greats

Outtasite (Outta Mind)

 

And for the few here who care, here was Sleater-Kinney's setlist as played:

High In The Grass

Hurry On Home

Price Tag

Down The Line

Jumpers

Shadow Town

What's Mine Is Yours

Can I Go On

Path Of Wellness

A New Wave

Complex Female Characters

Surface Envy

Modern Girl

Bring Mercy

The Fox

Worry With You

One Beat>

Entertain

1 hour ago, parisisstale said:

You summed it up perfectly as always, Paul.  Not one of my best shows by any means but one I’ll never forget.

 

Now Philly on the other hand.....Wowee Zowee....on so many levels.  I’ll let Paul have the honors on starting the recap.  #nevermissasundayshow

Thanks, but uh oh, it sounds like you might not entirely like what I have to say about Philly...

Toward the end of Wilco's rain-shortened set tonight at Forest Hills Stadium, Jeff looked out from the stage at the torrents of rain falling on drenched audience members and told them he wished he and his bandmates could be physically closer to them. The problem was, Jeff explained, that when the band had initially been set up closer to the front of the covered stage, there was a hole in the roof just where he would have been standing and joked that would have been the perfect visual representation for his songs — that of a solitary figure standing there while rain fell on him.

 

In some ways, you could say that image should be on the front of a T-shirt or poster commemorating this entire "It's Time" tour with Sleater-Kinney and Nnamdi. The run of shows has seemingly been cursed from the start — from support act Nnamdi breaking his wrist and needing surgery just before the first show he was supposed to play to the rise of Covid cases around the country forcing last-minute venue changes and vaccine and mask mandates to extreme weather challenges that have forced cancellations and uncomfortable conditions.

 

And yet, thanks in large part to the legendary Wilcrew and other behind-the-scenes tour personnel, Wilco and the other acts have soldiered on as best they can. Tonight's New York City-area tour stop was no exception, with the effects of Hurricane (or Tropical Storm) Henri hitting the area about halfway through Sleater-Kinney's set and forcing officials to clear the 13,000-capacity stadium for the better part of an hour. Personally I was getting some serious Kansas City déja vu from the show there when Sleater-Kinney also was forced into an abbreviated set and then the venue was cleared before Wilco ultimately had to cancel its performance. I think many of us at the show tonight were probably at least partly preparing for the possibility of another backstage jam room Instagram live stream.

 

But that didn't happen this time. After a quick announcement, people trudged back into the stadium and shortly thereafter — voila! — Wilco took the stage. If there was any silver lining whatsoever to the stormy conditions, it came almost immediately when Jeff called Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker from Sleater-Kinney out on stage for the long-awaited first real collaboration between the two co-headliners — they had sort of performed together virtually on the aforementioned IG live stream — on A Shot In The Arm. Brownstein pretty much stuck to a couple of maracas and a little bit of backing vocals on the chorus, but if memory serves, I think Tucker might have even taken a turn on lead vocals for a verse with what looked like the help of a little cheat sheet for the lyrics. Anyway, I'm glad it finally happened — and, who knows, maybe we'll even get a reprise later this week.

 

As for the rest of the set, which actually went on for about an hour, the rain let up briefly for a few songs early on before returning in earnest during Impossible Germany and pretty much continuing for the duration. Jeff did his best to try and forge a connection with the water-logged audience, stepping out to the lip of the stage and turning the microphone outward during the singalong section of Hummingbird and checking in on more than one occasion, saying how honored he and his bandmates felt to be able to perform, especially for those who had decided to make this their first post-lockdown concert.

 

Probably Jeff's best visit to Banter Corner — other than his Charlie Brown raincloud bit that I mentioned at the top — came when Nels' Jerry Jones double-neck longhorn white guitar made an appearance in preparation for Dawned On Me. Jeff usually pokes fun at the garishness of the instrument in some way, but tonight he quipped, "That’s not the kind of guitar you see in the rain every day. Nels, if you stood out in the rain with that guitar, that would be the most Prince thing you’ve ever done." I couldn't help imagining an epic Purple Rain moment of some sort just then, but alas I don't think Nels has in him the sheer flamboyant, look-at-me-ness of the Artist Formerly Known As..., though he certainly has his own special charisma.

 

I also must mention that despite the adverse conditions, I thought the sound was pretty fantastic. I'm no audio expert, but to my ears, this has to be due at least in part to the quality of the PA system, right? I know Forest Hills Stadium was renovated for use as a concert venue and opened in 2013 and I've seen a couple other shows there (one of the Paul Simon "farewell" concerts, which coincidentally also took place in a monsoon, comes to mind), so I'm guessing that they didn't spare too much expense in installing a powerhouse sound setup. And with the outdoor-venue, greatest-hits set that Jeff and Co. are playing on this run, it definitely makes it more enjoyable — or at least more bearable — to hear some of the songs you hear all the time when they sound especially good.

 

Can't think of too much else to say about this one, but I'm probably forgetting something. Then again, I think I'm still drying off. Will this one go down as one of the best shows I've ever seen Wilco play? Probably not. Was it one of the most enjoyable from a comfort standpoint? Hardly. Will I remember it for a long time? Unquestionably. And I guess that's maybe all you can ask for from a good old-fashioned rock show that somehow went on amid hurricane-like conditions during a global pandemic.

 

Here was Wilco's complete setlist, as played (obviously this was an abridged set due to weather conditions, so there were probably at least one or two songs on the printed setlist that were omitted):

A Shot In The Arm (w/Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker on backing vocals and percussion)

Random Name Generator

At Least That's What You Said

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Hummingbird

Everyone Hides

Box Full Of Letters

Dawned On Me

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

I'm The Man Who Loves You

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm Always In Love

 

And Sleater-Kinney's abbreviated setlist, as played, for those who care:

High In The Grass

Hurry On Home

Price Tag

Down The Line

Jumpers

Shadow Town

Can I Go On

Path Of Wellness

A New Wave

It's funny, I've never really thought of Merriweather Post Pavilion as a "legendary" venue along the lines of Red Rocks or the Hollywood Bowl or places like that. I'm sure that's probably sacrilegious to those in the Washington, D.C./Baltimore area, but even when I lived on the East Coast, I just always sort of thought of it as another in a series of sheds from Maine to Florida that bands eventually play if they reach a certain level. But hey, not every shed gets a landmark album named after it and I recently met someone who told me that they were at this mythical concert back in 1969. And heck, the place is even noteworthy enough to prompt a visit by esteemed VCer nalafej — good to see you — so what do I know? k

 

Since I'd last visited the sprawling 54-year-old amphitheater, which may have been one of the places to establish what we think of as the modern shed setup (pit/seating/lawn), the place has gotten something of a facelift with a sturdy-looking roof and concrete balcony structure installed over the pit and seating areas that reminded me of another DC-area venue, Wolf Trap. Fortunately, MPP is big enough and/or the show not sold out enough that there seemed to be enough room for pretty much everyone to space out, watch the concert from where they wanted and still get a decent view — no small thing in these crazy Covid times.

 

The unfortunate thing, at least personally, was that because of the nature of the venue, the location of the speakers and other acoustic factors, being up front — at least if you weren't right in front of one of the "fill" monitors facing outward from the stage — probably wasn't the ideal spot to take in the show. I guess that's almost always true at any venue, that you sacrifice sound quality by being closer to the stage, but for me it was especially pronounced tonight. I'm sure the bands all sounded amazing from, say, 10 rows back in the seats or at the front of the lawn, but it was honestly a bit muddy for me and that did detract a little bit from my enjoyment, I must admit.

 

Then again, being closer to the stage also brings with it some advantages, and I have to give kudos to a few of the folks I was standing next to, who were just super enthusiastic for everything from Nnamdi's opening set (which keeps getting better and better, by the way) to Sleater-Kinney's energetic escapades to Wilco's sturdy headlining act. When you've seen a few shows on a run, especially when the setlists are pretty similar night to night, it's nice to be able to get — dare I say it? — a shot in the arm of excitement and perspective from other people.

 

As for Wilco's performance, when a security guard came by early on in the evening and showed the set times on his phone with Jeff and Co. slated for 9:30-10:45 p.m., I was hoping the set wouldn't be rushed even more than usual because of some random curfew. I guess I wasn't the only one for whom the night was flying by, because it seemed like the band had barely gotten warmed up when Jeff glanced over at the ever-present clock at the side of the stage around 10:30 and announced that, "We're getting close to running out of time, so we're just gonna try to play as many songs as we can." Fortunately, the show wound up reaching a satisfactory conclusion at 11 without feeling too rushed and we even got a three-song encore! Three whole songs, can you imagine? I mean, it's hardly the days of two or three encores with as many as eight or 10 total tunes, but hey, Covid. We take what we can get, right?

 

On this night, what we got was the tour debut of You Are My Face (excellent to hear that one again), a decent dose of Ode To Joy (Jeff repeated the joke he's been making about how that album "came out just in time for all the joy") as well as a somewhat surprise Outtasite (Outta Mind) (which utterly delighted the very earnest fan to my left, who had really, really been hoping to hear that one). Also of note was the continuing development of what I guess we'll call "The End" version of Heavy Metal Drummer with Jeff essentially doing a laconic spoken-word intro to the song for about 30 seconds as his bandmates kind of filled in with some light psychedelic jams underneath before launching into the full version of the song (with Glenn actually playing the sample from the recorded version).

 

Overall the band seemed to be in pretty good spirits as the back half of the tour winds down — six shows left for that hoped-for collab with Sleater-Kinney, but who's counting? — and Jeff noted in the encore "that we always have such a good time here." Jeff and Nels even had kind of a sweet little moment during The Late Greats when Jeff went over and briefly hugged Nels as he was holding a note during the middle section, and there were a lot of smiles all around. I was thinking that it can't necessarily be easy to do this tour, with the bands and crews being in relatively tight bubbles and not able to visit with guests, see friends or do things they might ordinarily otherwise do. Add to that some of the wild weather challenges and scheduling issues and other things that we probably aren't even aware of, well, you know that this probably isn't your run-of-the-mill run of shows. So I just have to say kudos to everyone involved for enduring and making it happen and giving those of us in the audience at least some semblance of normality.

 

About seven songs in, Jeff asked how many people were having their first live-music experience back at this show and he seemed touched that there were so many affirmative responses. "It's an honor," he said. "Thanks for letting us entertain you. It really means a lot." And after another remarkable Nels solo on Impossible Germany, Jeff chimed in, "I don't know about you, but I missed that."

 

For as much as we might nitpick things on this forum and elsewhere, I think we all did. And I just really hope that we won't have to miss it again anytime soon.

 

Here was Wilco's complete setlist, as played (didn't get a look at the printed list, so can't say if there were any changes/omissions):

A Shot In The Arm

Random Name Generator

Before Us

You Are My Face

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>

Art Of Almost

If I Ever Was A Child

Impossible Germany

Love Is Everywhere (Beware)

Box Full Of Letters

Hummingbird

Everyone Hides

Born Alone

Jesus, etc.

Theologians

I'm The Man Who Loves You

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm Always In Love

----------------------------------------------

The Late Greats

Outtasite (Outta Mind)

California Stars

 

And for anyone who cares, here was Sleater-Kinney's setlist:

High In The Grass

Hurry On Home

A New Wave

Shadow Town

The Fox

Can I Go On

Path Of Wellness

Price Tag

Down The Line

Bury Our Friends

Jumpers

Bring Mercy

Modern Girl

Surface Envy

Worry With You

One Beat>

Entertain