Jeff Tweedy — 3 April 2019, Toronto, Canada (Queen Elizabeth Theatre)

[bböp]

Someone will probably have to confirm this for me, because I wasn't blessed with a particularly great seat at the anachronistic Queen Elizabeth Theatre, but did Jeff duck out of the building a little early last night and onto the idling tour bus he joked about? Or at least his spirit? Because I thought I had gone to a Jeff Tweedy show only to watch a Neil Young concert break out...

 

I kid, of course, because although Jeff played not one, but two, songs by the Canadian legend, he did so in an unmistakably Tweedyian attempt at connecting with an audience that to that point had decidedly not embraced his campfire vision for the second half of his set. So after suggesting that "we all sing a song together," before Let's Go Rain, and following that up with other favorites like Jesus, etc. and California Stars, Jeff mused aloud about "how deep a cut by Neil Young it would take for a Canadian audience" not to know the words. Then he started playing a Neil song that he has deployed fairly regularly over the years — The Losing End (When You're On) from Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere — and said something to the effect of "let's try this one...it's not that deep a cut."

 

A few bars into the song, a guy toward the back half of the room apparently recognized the song and bellowed out, "The Losing End!" Jeff paused briefly, looked out into the darkness and replied drily, "Yeah that's right, it's The Losing End. But that's not the same as singing it." The crowd sort of muddled its way through from that point, with Jeff almost dropping it entirely at one point when he said, "I'm not gonna play it if you're not gonna sing it," before finally seeing it through to the end.

 

"I found that uplifting," Jeff quipped afterward, "because you did almost as badly with that one as the songs I wrote. I'm gonna take that with me."

 

At that point someone else apparently yelled out for Cinnamon Girl, which Jeff said he unquestionably knew how to play but said he would have to change a tuning on the guitar he had in hand, which he said he wasn't going to do. So instead he launched into another of his own potential singalong numbers, Passenger Side, and even briefly acknowledged the Neil Young reference in the second verse, saying that "you sort of get two for one here."

 

In the first part of his set, Jeff actually seemed quite focused within the black-box confines of the QET (though I did notice that he sort of "botched" the transition between Bombs Above and Some Birds, which I don't remember happening before). He went through some of the most successful bits he has used on this Warm run, including the introduction to Guaranteed which always gets a genuine laugh every night as well as showing off his list of the song requests for each show and fake-lamenting how every song gets exactly one request every night and how there's "no consensus because there's no fucking hit." (He did identify One Sunday Morning as the top request-getter for this show with a whopping 214, which he attributed to someone being "a computer genius." When that person outed himself, Jeff half-jokingly told him that he could leave now.)

 

A handful of songs later, Jeff went on his longest visit to Banter Corner when he apparently spotted a woman sitting in a seat to his far right that reminded him of the "creepy" woman who had kept trying to talk to him at his previous show in Ann Arbor. He also once again mentioned the guy "Josh" in Columbus who really wanted him to know it was his birthday (as well as telling the funny story from that show about the coat in the aisle that resembled ET). "There's been some fairly rough people so far on this tour," Jeff said, "so if I seem a little skittish, it's been some rough sledding. I just wanted to let you know where I was at."

 

Subsequently, it seemed like the Canadians weren't gonna miss out on their moment to leave their own a sketchy impression on Jeff when he mistook/didn't understand something some guy was yelling out and made a crack about how he was going to take a break and "go backstage and shotgun a couple beers and then maybe I'll understand what you're saying." Jeff said they would be his first beers in about 30 years, so it would probably only take a couple. I wasn't close enough to fully get the gist of this little interlude, though, so maybe someone can fill in anything I missed.

 

In terms of other banter, there was also a funny little bit I hadn't heard before, during Jeff's introduction to Let's Go Rain, when he shared that a magazine had recently asked him to fill out some sort of "pie chart" about his view of what Americans were and he roughly estimated that approximately 30 percent of Americans that had ever existed were dead and so he filled in the chart for the other 70 percent as "jealous." That bit probably needs a little more work, but I think it could be another winner.

 

Anyway, I wanted to say a few brief words about the venue before I wrap this up. It's actually not the first time Jeff has performed there; he did shows on consecutive nights in 2011. I was at those as well, but trekking over there tonight, I couldn't help but wonder why this venue was used again (probably because it has some affiliation with the show promoter, which I think was Live Nation). There must not be a decent theater-type room of this size anywhere else in town because, otherwise, it seems like it would be the last place I'd choose. It's at the far end of Exhibition Place, a huge district west of downtown that is home to convention centers, exhibition halls and the stadium for the Toronto FC soccer team, among other things. It's virtually deserted at night, which I remember from the last time, and the signage is not all that great, so you just have this eerie feeling of endlessly walking through a labyrinth of empty parking lots and barren buildings. Also, I couldn't help but notice that the building that actually housed the theater in which Jeff played literally had a homeless shelter in it. You could see through some windows that there were rows of beds and cots set up, some with people in them, and it was just an odd juxtaposition to walk past that and around the corner to the theater entrance.

 

I'm not even going to go into the dated feel of the theater itself. I had thought my seat was in the balcony (and is in fact listed on the ticket as such) but quickly discovered that there isn't really a balcony at all but just a different section of seating in the back of the room that sloped up a bit. Legroom was pretty non-existent. To be honest, the whole place seemed kind of like a combination between a bad nightclub and a 1960s-era civic auditorium. I suppose the best thing it had going for it was that the sound, at least where I was sitting, was pretty spot on.

 

At any rate, to finish where we started, of course once Jeff teased the possibility of Cinnamon Girl earlier in the set, you kind of figured there was a decent chance he might come back to it later on. I just didn't think he'd finish the show with it. But after more than a couple of shaky singalongs, I guess he must've finally gotten the sort of connection with the audience he had hoped for — or at least the best one he thought he was going to get on this night — and decided to leave it at that. It made for a slightly abrupt end to the show, perhaps, but ultimately a satisfying-enough one.

 

Here was the complete setlist, as played:

 

Via Chicago (w/harmonica)

Bombs Above

Some Birds

One Sunday Morning (Song For Jane Smiley's Boyfriend)

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart

New Madrid

Hummingbird

Having Been Is No Way To Be

Guaranteed

You And I

White Wooden Cross

The Ruling Class

Let's Go Rain

Jesus, etc.

Evergreen

California Stars

I Know What It's Like

The Losing End (When You're On) [Neil Young]

Passenger Side

I'm The Man Who Loves You

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

Don't Forget

A Shot in the Arm

Cinnamon Girl [Neil Young]

[likely Japan]

I heard that Wilco has already planned/scheduled to come back to Toronto this Fall. Has anybody also heard about it? Does anybody know potential dates??

It was great show. In the last few Wilco/Jeff's shows in Toronto, audience was aggressive but last night we were appreciative. 

[50footqueenie]

Sounds like a great venue and part of town but I bet you got that special Canadiana welcome, eh?

[bböp]

Sounds like a great venue and part of town but I bet you got that special Canadiana welcome, eh?

 

And what would that be, a couple of Mooseheads, some poutine and an apology?

 

I heard that Wilco has already planned/scheduled to come back to Toronto this Fall. Has anybody also heard about it? Does anybody know potential dates??

It was great show. In the last few Wilco/Jeff's shows in Toronto, audience was aggressive but last night we were appreciative. 

 

I haven't heard anything about fall tour dates yet, but assuming the next Wilco record comes out this summer or fall, as has been rumored, I would assume there will be at least some touring in the U.S. and Canada in October or November.

[Albert Tatlock]

Ta. I have informed Her Majesty of the shortcomings of this auditorium and I am sure her name will soon be expunged from its title. Reputation is everything.

[Cluett]

Having also been to both nights of the 2011 shows, I have to say I like the QET precisely becuase one of your comments - the sound. It really does sound amazing in there.

Having now gone to too many shows at the Danforth because of the Massey reno, I was relieved this was at QET: better sound, seating (the audiences are only getting older), you can pay for a beer with a credit/debit card, and the Dufferin bus is 5 minutes away.

[TCP]

Sorry for the necro-bump but I want to compliment bbop for his astute observation that this place is a dump. I was there tonight for Kurt Vile, when I got there, I noticed the state of the place and then remembered this report. I saw multiple chairs with old gum stuck to the seats. I could keep going but let's just sum it up and say the whole place is just a dive. Hopefully next time I'm in T.O. I can check out Massey Hall if it's open again.

[bböp]

Sorry for the necro-bump but I want to compliment bbop for his astute observation that this place is a dump. I was there tonight for Kurt Vile, when I got there, I noticed the state of the place and then remembered this report. I saw multiple chairs with old gum stuck to the seats. I could keep going but let's just sum it up and say the whole place is just a dive. Hopefully next time I'm in T.O. I can check out Massey Hall if it's open again.

It’s also in the middle of nowhere, and there’s a homeless shelter in the same building! I don’t get why Toronto doesn’t have a more suitable theater venue than this, or is it because Live Nation owns it so they get certain bookings almost by default?