Wilco — 29 August 2025, Calgary, AB, Canada (Southern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium)

[TCP]

Hey everyone, our designated reporter was strangely absent last night. I did hear a rumour online he's been spotted at a show for some band from Manchester, which sounds fun. But somehow, I've been assigned the responsibility for the recap for last night's gig... hopefully I'm up to the challenge. First, let's set the scene.

 

In a year when the United States president has openly talked about annexing Canada and then imposed extremely unfair tariffs in a blatant attempt to pressure the Great White North to joining the union, it's more important than ever that America's greatest rock & roll band Wilco, come north of the 49th parallel to try to ease some of the tensions. Or maybe it was just the online pressure that forced Wilco to book some Western Canadian shows. Either way, the band took the stage for an 'Evening With' performance, their second in the city since the COVID pandemic, to a very grateful Calgary audience. 

Despite my joking in the previous paragraph, the current political situation has forced some of the Canadian members of the Wilco Faithful to avoid US shows this summer, so the band not only performed in front of a nearly full audience of Albertans, but also to fans from around the country, including British Columbia, Manitoba (me!), and even far off places like Ontario. Even though my current home of Winnipeg was rejected from this run of shows (despite not having a show since before the pandemic), I won't hold that against the band. Clearly showing Western Canada some love was a priority before the band embarks on a hiatus that will last at least until early next year.

The band took the stage at 8:07pm Mountain Time. Story To Tell has been the opener for the first sets during this 'Evening With' run and it set the tone for the evening... deep cuts, classic hits, they're all stories that the band has come to tell. 

I was curious what the band's energy level would be at, since this is the second to last show of a long run of shows this summer that basically began in April and, with only a break in July, included a jaunt to Europe, a traveling festival with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson, and a month of these 'Evening With' shows containing about 10 more songs than the usual Wilco setlist. But if they were understandably tired, you wouldn't have known... as soon as they launched into the groove of the second song of the evening, Handshake Drugs, it was evident this is a band loving being on stage and performing together. If there was any further doubt to the band's energy, that would have been annihilated ten songs later when they brought the roof of the Southern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium down with Bird Without a Tail / Base of My Skull. I was seated in the front row directly in front of Pat, which really lead me to appreciate his lead guitar chops on the aforementioned Bird/Skull. He finished the song to a long and loud applause from the audience and I was reminded of my thoughts seeing this song performed last summer at Massey Hall in Toronto... Pat is a fantastic guitarist and I think his guitar work has gone under appreciated by the fans. Which is somewhat understandable when you do have a guitarist like Nels Cline in the band, so it's really great that Pat now has his own signature showcase song. Nels, of course, does a great job supporting Pat with some parts that make the instrumental section of that song feel almost like a guitar duet. When he received the applause from the audience, Pat for his part, directed the audience's praise to Nels via a gesture. I really admire how much these guys like playing together. It's been clear to me with the band members sharing gigs together outside of Wilco shows, and doing things like taking pictures for each other's album covers there's lots of camaraderie across the band in this era. Personally, I think it's heartwarming! 

As for banter in Set 1, early on after the title track of 2023's Cruel Country, Jeff asked the audience if they knew what they had gotten themselves into. He then explained the structure for tonight's performance, two sets with a break in between. He then mentioned that the songs between the two sets would be different. You see, it was Glenn who insisted Jeff mention that because he wasn't sure the audience was smart enough to figure that out. That elicited some playful "c'mon Glenn" from the audience.

Later on in Set 1, Jeff received an "I love you!" declaration from an enthusiastic audience member, which was shortly followed up by a secondary "I love you" from a different audience member. Jeff warned the devotees that they have some competition which got a good chuckle from the crowd.

John received a loud applause from the audience as he stepped up to Jeff's mic with an acoustic guitar in hand to perform 'It's Just That Simple'. Of course it's always interesting to see Jeff on bass, and I think it's sometimes forgotten that during Uncle Tupelo he was primarily the bass player. For those of us that missed that era, we can get a taste of it when Jeff gets handed his very own hollow body bass guitar. Jeff has a notoriously large guitar collection and this is really his one chance to bring one of his (I'm sure many) bass guitars on stage, so it makes sense with Wilco's larger touring configuration he'd want to play his own bass, even though you can't help but wonder for the one song if it would be easier to just pass each other their instruments, like Canadian rock ensemble Sloan does. As I was thinking all of this, the song started but Jeff's bass was't making sound. After consulting with his guitar tech, Jeff was handed John's Fender Jazz Bass, and came in just in time for the second section of the first verse. Did I subconsciously cause the output jack of Jeff's bass to stop working to force the band to more closely emulate my favourite Canadian band? No, but I did find it an interesting coincidence. Anyways, all of this results in some laughs between Jeff and John after the songs conclusion (which also resulted in loud applause for John). 

This was my first time hearing the acoustic version of I'm Always In Love in person, between the acoustic Spiders and Art of Almost, they're building a nice collection of acoustic alternate arrangements.

Via Chicago featured a direct transition into California Stars, Jeff did some of his frantic acoustic strumming fretted high on the neck, along with some sonic additions from Glenn and probably a few other members. Sorry for being vague, I was trying to understand what was happening as Via was definitely done and then before I made sense of it, Cali Stars was starting. None the less it was cool and made the two compositions feel like one large piece.

For the second set, the band walked out on stage to the ominous theme song of Jaws. The threatening music was quickly juxtaposed with a very joyous rendition of The Late Greats. After TLG Jeff noted a number of empty seats in front of the stage slowly being filled and joking invited the crowd to "come back in". At least for the men's room I can confirm the line was long and the bathroom only featured two urinals and maybe four toilets. So if you were hoping to relieve yourself and then grab another drink, the 20 minute intermission wouldn't have been enough. Fortunately by the end of Theologians it seems most of the empty seats were filled again.

After Passenger Side but before Annihilation, Jeff remarked that they like playing a song from their oldest album back to back with one of their newest songs, so we can "marvel at their 30 years of growth".

Later in the set someone near the centre of the front row yelled out something I missed but it lead to a conversation with Jeff asking him if he's with the symphony. He confirmed and Jeff mentioned it was Glenn who recognized him. Which lead to the member of the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra proclaiming "well Glenn's the shit". This caused a big laugh but I think it was confirmed that they were both percussionists looking out for each other. I don't know what Glenn has done with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra that causes him to recognize members in the crowd, maybe he's just a big fan? Either way I'm not doing it justice but it was a great exchange.

Throughout the night you could tell certain audience members were itching to stand. In fact during California Stars about half the audience stood. They popped up again at various times, but it wasn't until right before Hate It Here where Jeff encouraged the audience to stand. I'm fairly tall (and extremely muscular... no one fact check me on this!) and was sitting in the front row and am still tramatized from earlier this spring when Bob Dylan fans got mad at me for standing during his performance in Mankato, MN. So it was much appreciated by me that Jeff told the audience to stand, explaining "they're not going to rock and harder" than the upcoming songs. I recall seeing the band back in 2020 in Winnipeg (their last performance there......) and someone asked Jeff if the audience could stand and he told her we'd "have to sort that out ourselves". I don't know where this change of attitude came from but it definitely makes for a more engaging end to the show with everyone standing and rocking out.

 

Anyways, that's all we got time for. The band is off to Edmonton today for a show at the Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium. Edmonton and Calgary are fierce rivals, so if you're the provincial government and you do something nice for one town like... build a beautiful music auditorium, you have to build an exact duplicate in the other city. See some of you there!

 

 

Set 1

Story To Tell

Handshake Drugs

One Sunday Morning

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart

If I Ever Was A Child

Cruel Country

Forget the Flowers

Evicted

Spiders (Kidsmoke) (acoustic arrangement)

Bird Without A Tail/Base Of My Skull

I'm Always In Love (acoustic arrangement; Jeff on acoustic)

Hesitating Beauty

Hummingbird

It's Just That Simple

Via Chicago>

California Stars

 

 

Set 2

The Late Greats

Theologians

Side With The Seeds

Box Full Of Letters

Annihilation

Sunken Treasure (acoustic arrangement; Jeff on acoustic with no harmonica)

Either Way

Impossible Germany

Jesus, etc.

Hate It Here

Heavy Metal Drummer

I'm The Man Who Loves you

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

Falling Apart (Right Now)

Walken

I Got You (At The End Of The Century)

 

Falling Apart was on the setlist as the final song for Set 1. U.S. Blues was on the setlist as the final song of the encore but wasn't played.

[TCP]

Post is updated!

I swear I tried to keep it as concise as possible 😅

[Ghost Of Bob Cumming]

Thanks for standing in, TCP. I, for one, appreciate it.

 

As I've told our regular correspondent a couple of times, I discovered the true pinnacle of this internet thing back in 1995 when I realised I could read a review of Wilco playing in Oven Chips, Missouri within a few hours of it happening. Doesn't get any better than that.

[Albert Tatlock]

On 8/30/2025 at 7:30 AM, TCP said:

spotted at a show for some band from Manchester

Jesus, his standards are slipping. Only if he goes to see CMAT in September will my faith be restored.

 

Ta