2011 Concert Journals

[plvarona]

It looks like I'm starting the "Concert Journal" thread again this year.

Last weekend, I saw my first concerts of 2011.  I headed up to Metairie (Western New Orleans) to catch a few hours of their Family Gras festivities.  Essentially, this festival is intended to capture some of the Mardi Gras festivities without nudity or otherwise lewd conduct.  The centerpiece is a series of free concerts by Nationally-known acts that go on throughout the weekend.  I caught a pair of the concerts last Saturday afternoon.

The first act I saw was Sister Hazel, one of my favorites from college.  Sister Hazel's music is pretty catchy, and not surprisingly, it went over well in a live setting.  What I was not expecting was the amout of jamming they would do.  The good thing was that they never lost sight of the original song when they jammed, so they were able to entertain without going over the top.  I was also pleasantly surprised with how well the guys harmonized.  So overall, the band sounded good and were quite entertaining at the same time.  They certainly aren't the most energetic band I've seen, but they made the best of what they had and I appreciated it.

Next, I headed to a smaller stage to catch Ingram Hill.  Their music also tends to be quite catchy, and once again, that also translated well to a live setting.  The guys just weren't quite as polished as Sister Hazel, and their drummer seemed to plod a little bit on some of the faster songs.  Those things not withstanding, it was still a pretty solid set.

I headed out after Ingram Hill finished, since none of the other acts on the lineup interested me that much.  Tito Jackson was playing on the main stage as I was leaving, and I think I heard his background singers doing more singing than he was.

Set Lists:

Sister Hazel: "Shame", "Come Around", "Happy", "Your Mistake", "Your Winter"/(outro to the Eagles' "Hotel California"), "The Road", Medley of "We'll Find It"/"Thank You"/"Just Remember"/(one other song I didn't recognize that had Andrew Copeland on lead vocals), "Take a Bow", "Beautiful Thing", "Mandolin Moon", cover of "Man of Constant Sorrow"/"At Your Worst", "All For You", "Change Your Mind", "Champagne High", "Swan Dive"

Ingram Hill: "Lady Gray", "I Hear Goodnight", "Chicago", "Impossible", "What If I'm Right", "Broken Lover", "She Wants to Be Alone", "Will I Ever Make It Home?", "Miss Kennedy", "On My Way", "Hey Girl", "Almost Perfect", "Four Letter Word"

[ajyouthguy]

I mentioned this was a possibility in the past in another thread, but as of last Thursday, it is official, I'm super excited to say that we are officially going to be able to host one of the very last tour dates of Cool Hand Luke, as they are on a farewell tour in April and May, in our little rural Arkansas Southern Baptist church, May 21...and our opener is going to be Jason Truby, formerly guitarist for POD and Living Sacrifice.

[plvarona]

About a week and a half ago I saw the Robbie Seay Band at a church near the LSU campus.  It was a good, solid show for them too.  I figured their Coldplay-influenced sound would go over well in a live setting, and it did.  I also appreciated Robbie's dry sense of humor, as he kept referring to him just writing songs in his bathroom.  The band doesn't have the most stage presence, but at least they sounded good, and I think that's the most important thing to get right.  So while this wasn't "Concert of the Year" material, it was a worthwhile show to attend.

Set List: "O Great Love", "Hallelujah, God is Near", "There is a Call", "Jesus Paid It All", "Your Love is Strong", "Rise", "Let Our Faith Be Not Alone", "Come Ye Sinners", (lengthy Compassion International presentation), "Come Thou Fount", "Shine Your Light On Us", "Song of Hope", "Better Days"

[ajyouthguy]

Holy wow, not sure there are many, if any, artists who are as passionate, as talented, and as fun as Robert Randolph and the Family Band.  They played for almost two hours, and had a blast all through it.  They are phenomenal talents all around.  They played about half of the We Walk This Road album, a couple of songs off of Colorbline, and some of their traditionally popular jams like "The March" and "Shake Your Hips."  They seamlessly traded off on vocals...Robert had the most leads, obviously, but Danyell had plenty and so did Robert's sister Lenesha and the keyboard/guitarist/harmonica player, the only white guy in the band, and everyone, including cousin Marcus on drums, had harmony vocals.  It's so hard to describe adequately, but suffice it to say it was well worth the hour drive, even though I went alone and didn't get home until 1:00 or so (after being up late the night before as well).  I've been to 150+ shows in my life and musically, there are few, if any, that match this one.

[murlough23]

Yay for token white guys. Them and TV on the Radio have that in common.

Robert Randolph sounds fun in concert, but whenever I've seen live clips of them, they tend to drag songs out a little too long for my liking. That used to bug me sometimes when I was really big on the Dave Matthews Band. (Though I'd gladly waive this complaint if afforded the chance to see Matthews and Randolph perform together, which they've done on several occasions.)

[ajyouthguy]

Yay for token white guys. Them and TV on the Radio have that in common.

Robert Randolph sounds fun in concert, but whenever I've seen live clips of them, they tend to drag songs out a little too long for my liking. That used to bug me sometimes when I was really big on the Dave Matthews Band. (Though I'd gladly waive this complaint if afforded the chance to see Matthews and Randolph perform together, which they've done on several occasions.)

then you might not have liked it.

and the white guy, for what it's worth, is as talented as all of the other guys...all of them are really incredible. 

[murlough23]

and the white guy, for what it's worth, is as talented as all of the other guys...all of them are really incredible. 

That was just a gag. It's the inverse of how it usually goes in rock bands. (The one in TVOTR is really talented as well.)

[plvarona]

Interestingly enough, I also saw Robert Randolph & The Family Band recently.  I saw them last Sunday at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, and I'm pretty much going to echo what AJ said.  As usual, their musicianship was excellent, and they were able to trade off vocals, and on some songs instruments, seamlessly.  On top of that, I could tell the band was having a lot of fun, and that translated to the crowd.  The little interactions between the band members, especially between Lenesha and Danyell, added to the fun.  Essentially, the set was one big party.  As for the jamming, I didn't think it was excessive.  The only where it might have been a bit much was "Ain't Nothing Wrong With That", which more than doubled in length compared to the CD.  However, given that was the last song they played, and it is also one of their most recognizeable songs, I thought the extension of that song was understandable.  Overall, this set was definitely the highlight of my trip to Jazz Fest this year, and it has taken a big lead in my "Concert of the Year" standings so far.

Going reverse chronologically, before seeing Robert Randolph, I caught the Generationals.  They are a retro pop/rock band from New Orleans who got some national attention a few years ago when one of their songs was used in a movie.  They turned in a pretty catchy set as well.  The band does lack in stage presence a little bit, but their music is so catchy, I still enjoyed their set quite a bit.  Apparently I wasn't the only one either, because the crowd got more into them as the set went on.

Also that day, I caught Playing For Change, an 8-piece band primarily from Africa.  Their repertoire was pretty diverse, ranging from blues to African pop to American soul.  Rich instrumentation highlighted this set, as they included many different percussion instruments, from bongo drums to maracas.  They even had a blind old man on harmonica and background vocals, and he can still sing and play quite well.  On top of that, the band members were very animated, adding to the fun.  This added up to an enjoyable set at the beginning of the day.  I also caught Tabou Combo of Haiti.  They were fun, but a bit one-dimensional as all of their songs sounded similar.

Selected Set Lists:

Robert Randolph & The Family Band: "Good Time (3 stroke)", "Travelling Shoes", "Squeeze", "I Don't Want to Be a Solider Mama", "Walk Don't Walk", "Purple Haze" (Jimi Hendrix cover), "Don't Change", "If I Had My Way", (instrumental featuring a guest bassist and harmonica player), "Deliver Me", (instrumental featuring an instrument swap with Lenesha on drums and the drummer on the pedal steel), "The March"
Encore: "Whole Lotta Love" (partial Led Zeppelin cover)/"Ain't Nothing Wrong With That"

Generationals: "Ten-Twenty-Ten", "Angry Charlie", (song I couldn't identify), "Dirty Mister Dirty", "Goose & Gander", "You Say It Too", "Tell Me Now", "Nobody Could Change Your Mind", "When They Fight, They Fight", "I Promise", "Yours Forever", "Please Be It", "Trust"

[ajyouthguy]

It was about 9 months in the making, but we had our Cool Hand Luke and Jason Truby concert last night at our church.  It was a phenomenal night.  Both artists were the real deal...talented, yes, but very humble, very real, very authentic, very unpretending, etc.  It didn't feel like a show as much as a group of people gathered to listen to a smaller very talented group of people who had something to say musically and lyrically that was challenging and inspiring.  Maybe that sounds hokey, but it had a different feel than most shows I've seen over the years.  I got to spend a lot of time with Truby and with all of the CHL guys, and they are what I would hope any "Christian" artist is but know that most aren't.  They were so gracious to us, apologizing for different aspects that didn't go as planned (before as well as during), thanking us repeatedly for having them, telling us we were as accommodating and generous and helpful and fun as anyone they had played for on this tour, things like that.  I loved the experience so much. 

Truby showed off on the guitar, doing some instrumental stuff, some stuff of of his vocal album Entropy, and a couple of covers.  He did some legit guitar magic definitely and easily won the crowd with a mix of electric and acoustic stuff.

CHL came out to the driving instrumental intro to the new album, "Hoshana," straight into the second song "Are You Coming?" (which seemed appropriate that they were sound-checking to that song right at 6:00 on the day of Harold Camping's rapture prediction, by the way, haha). They did about half of that album, including "His Eyes," "The Silver," and "I Remember."  They also played a few older songs like "The Mirror," "I'm Not Ready," and "This is Love."  I'm sure there were others, but that's off the top of my head, and Mark likes to talk a lot, which I'm sure would annoy some of you  guys, but it's neat to hear him talk about what's going on and the songs and their inspiration and things like that.  And he believes that is as important as the songs these days.   They stuck around for a long time afterwards talking to people then talking to me, my family a couple of my youth and a couple of other adults in our church. 

It was an awesome night, and it's neat that I finally got to see one of my favorite bands, on one of their very last shows ever (as it stands right now, we were the 4th to last show ever).

[plvarona]

Looking ahead, I will be making my first trip to Cornerstone Festival in Bushnell, Illinois at the end of this month.  I've already bought my ticket and squared away my travel arrangements and accommodations.  This has been on my radar since I attended the short-lived Florida version of Cornerstone six years ago, and this year my vacation schedule and my finances worked out so I can go.  I'll be there from Thursday to Saturday, and artists I'm hoping to catch include Denison Witmer (although I'll probably be arriving around the time he's playing), Paper Route, Children 18:3, Deas Vail, Seabird, Blindside and Anberlin.  I'm certainly looking forward to this trip.

[murlough23]

Mon 6/27/11 - Burlap to Cashmere, Hotel Cafe, Hollywood CA

Show Overall: A-

Partial Setlist:
Love Reclaims the Atmosphere
Orchestrated Love Song
Hey Man
Build a Wall
Closer to the Edge
Anybody Out There?
Seasons

Albums Represented:
Burlap to Cashmere (2011)
Anybody Out There? (1998)


Wed 9/14/11 - Fleet Foxes w/ The Walkmen, Greek Theatre, Hollywood, CA

Show Overall: B+
Fleet Foxes: A
The Walkmen: C+

Fleet Foxes Setlist:
The Plains/Bitter Dancer
Mykonos
English House
Battery Kinzie
Bedouin Dress
Sim Sala Bim
Your Protector
White Winter Hymnal
Ragged Wood
Montezuma
He Doesn't Know Why
Lorelai
The Shrine/An Argument
Blue Spotted Tail
Grown Ocean

Encore:
I Let You
Sun It Rises
Blue Ridge Mountains
Helplessness Blues

Albums Represented:
Helplessness Blues (2011)
Fleet Foxes (2008)
Sun Giant EP (2008)


Sat 10/8/11 - David Crowder Band w/ Gungor, Chris August & John Mark McMillan - Hollywood Palladium, Hollywood, CA

Show Overall: A-
David Crowder Band: A-
Gungor: A
Chris August: B-
John Mark McMillan: C+

David Crowder Band Setlist:
O Great God, Give Us Rest
The Veil
No One Like You
Foreverandever, Etc.
A Beautiful Collision
Intoxicating
Let Me Feel You Shine
The Glory of It All
Shadows/What a Miracle (snippet)
You Are My Joy
God Almighty, None Compares
Here Is Our King
Go Tell It on the Mountain
Because He Lives (Bill Gaither cover)
I Saw the Light (Hank Williams cover)/I'll Fly Away
How He Loves (John Mark McMillan cover, with John Mark McMillan and Michael Gungor)

Encore:
O Praise Him (All This For a King)
You Alone (snippet)
All I Can Say

Albums Represented:
Give Us Rest (A Requiem Mass in C [The Happiest of All Keys]) (2012)
Oh For Joy (2011)
Church Music (2009)
Remedy (2007)
A Collision (2005)
Illuminate (2003)
All I Can Say (1999)
Pour Over Me (1998)

Gungor Setlist:
When Death Dies
The Earth Is Yours
You Are the Beauty
You Have Me
Song For My Family
Beautiful Things

Albums Represented:
Ghosts Upon the Earth (2011)
Beautiful Things (2010)
Ancient Skies (2008)

Chris August Partial Setlist:
7x70
Amen
Starry Night


Tue 10/11/11 - Switchfoot w/ Anberlin & Atomic Tom - The Wiltern, Hollywood, CA

Show Overall: B
Switchfoot: B-
Anberlin: B+
Atomic Tom: C+

Switchfoot Setlist:
Afterlife
Stars
Mess of Me
Sabotage (Beastie Boys cover)
Selling the News
This Is Your Life
Restless
Dare You to Move
Your Love Is a Song
Dark Horses
The War Inside
Meant to Live

Encore:
Where I Belong
The Sound (John M. Perkins' Blues)

Albums Represented:
Vice Verses (2011)
Hello Hurricane (2009)
Nothing Is Sound (2005)
The Beautiful Letdown (2003)

Anberlin Setlist:
Reclusion
We Owe This to Ourselves
Paperthin Hymn
Never Take Friendship Personal
Pray Tell
The Resistance
Art of War
The Unwinding Cable Car
Alexithymia
Breaking
Dismantle. Repair.
Godspeed
Impossible
Feel Good Drag

Albums Represented:
Dark Is the Way, Light Is a Place (2010)
New Surrender (2008)
Cities (2007)
Never Take Friendship Personal (2005)


Fri 10/28/11 - Jars of Clay W/ Dave Barnes & Andrew Ripp - First Church of the Nazarene, Pasadena, CA

Show Overall: A
Jars of Clay: A+
Dave Barnes: B
Andrew Ripp: B+

Jars of Clay Setlist:
Liquid
Work
Something Beautiful
River Constantine
Closer
Safe to Land
Eyes Wide Open
No One Loves Me Like You
Jealous Kind
I Need You
Scarlet
Mirrors & Smoke
Flood
Dead Man (Carry Me)
Water Under the Bridge

Encore:
Frail
All My Tears (Julie Miller cover)
Worlds Apart

Albums Represented:
The Shelter (2010)
The Long Fall Back to Earth (2009)
Good Monsters (2006)
Who We Are Instead (2003)
The Eleventh Hour (2002)
If I Left the Zoo (1999)
Much Afraid (1997)
Jars of Clay (1995)


Mon 11/21/11 - Sleeping at Last w/ David Hodges - Hotel Cafe, Hollywood, CA

Show Overall: B
Sleeping at Last: B+
Dave Hodges: C+

Sleeping at Last Setlist:
Aperture
Umbrellas
Dear True Love
Emphasis
January White
Naïve
Next to Me
Silhouettes
Turning Page
Noble Aim
Needle & Thread

Albums Represented:
Yearbook EPs (2010-2011)
Storyboards (2009)
Keep No Score (2006)

[murlough23]

Burlap to Cashmere rocked the Hotel Cafe last night. Not many bands can do this without electric guitars. But Steven Delopoulos and his cousin Johnny Phillipidis are absolute monsters on the acoustic. The way Johnny plays is close to an epileptic fit at times, and the stage was so small, I'm surprised he didn't whack the keyboardist in the face.

They focused almost entirely on new material, and there aren't very many bands I can think of who could keep me transfixed with so many unfamiliar songs. The ones that weren't instantly addictive due to their insane rhythms (Delopoulos has a thing for 9/8, as heard in "Me Died Blue") were quite lush and gorgeous. I had forgotten what a way these guys had with vocal harmony. They actually opened with a slow song - "Love Reclaims the Atmosphere" - and even though I thought that was a surprising choice given their high-energy stage presence, it sucked me in almost immediately. The crowd was small but highly appreciative and supportive - I could tell that it had been a while since they'd played on the West Coast, and Steven was humbled and grateful by the show of support.

The only old-school B2C song to make an appearance was "Anybody Out There?", which they blew through like there was no tomorrow. I'll never tire of Johnny Phillipidis's ridiculous guitar solo in that one. (Fun fact: his last name is pronounced "Phil Lapidus".) Other than that, the only song I was intimately familiar with ahead of time was "Seasons", my favorite track from either of Delopoulos's solo albums. It was a treat to hear that one with a full band.

By all accounts, the new B2C record is gonna be awesome.

-----

Oh, and speaking of gorgeous vocal harmonies, I have tickets to see Fleet Foxes at the Greek Theatre in September. Not sure yet who I'm going with - I grabbed two just in case the wife was interested, but she's been out of town, so I haven't asked her if she wants to go yet and I'm not sure what she'll say.

[ewok20t3]

The only old-school B2C song to make an appearance was "Anybody Out There?", which they blew through like there was no tomorrow.

I'm not usually the type to be too disappointed if a band doesn't play my favorite song, but if I went to see B2C and they didn't play "Eileen's Song", I probably would've been pretty bummed.

[murlough23]

I'm not usually the type to be too disappointed if a band doesn't play my favorite song, but if I went to see B2C and they didn't play "Eileen's Song", I probably would've been pretty bummed.

I was honestly shocked to not get "Basic Instructions". I was certain when they left the stage that they'd be back to do either that or "Digee Dime" as an encore. But then so many of the tracks from their debut album seem essential. Who knows, maybe they'll play a completely different set tonight.

Honestly, though, the new stuff was just as jaw-dropping as their classic material, so I'd imagine there'll be some of those songs that I'll be disappointed to not hear if I see them live again somewhere down the road.

[plvarona]

I figure I might as well go ahead and give a "snapshot" of whom I saw at Cornerstone Festival yesterday while I'm chilling out in my hotel room.  I will be heading back to the festival after lunch today.

Denison Witmer:
I was only able to catch the last half of his set because I got lost on my way to the festival.  At least I caught two of my favorite songs of his ("California Brown and Blue", "Life Before Aesthetics") in the back half.  Denison's performance was pretty solid as well.  It was just him with an acoustic guitar, and the songs still sounded pretty good stripped-down.  I'll admit Denison's voice is quite nasal, but if you can put up with that, he's pretty enjoyable in concert.

Submission Red:
Musically they aren't my cup of tea, but they put on quite a performance.  The lead singer alone was a big spectacle.  Throughout the set, she was running around the stage, bumping her bandmates, waving a towel around, banging on a trash can and later jumping off that same trash can, running into the crowd and moshing with fans, spray-painting a red "X" on her shirt, and punctuating the set by falling on the stage floor.  If nothing else, this rated high on the "entertainment" scale.

Paper Route:
This was my favorite all-around performance of the night.  I'm sure some of you are curious as to how the band lines up without Andy Smith.  For one thing, they brought in a new background vocalist - a deep-voiced female singer at that.  (They did not mention her name during the set.)  J.T. Daly now does all of the lead vocals, and the female background singer comes in if a second vocalist is needed.  The new background singer also played keyboard on a new song called "Two Hearts", so I won't be surprised if she's going to be involved prominently in the future.  As for the performance itself, it was quite polished, and all of the different instruments really built the sound to produce an amazing final result.  From a visual perspective, the drummer was especially animated.  Essentially, this set was very strong musically, and good enough from a performance aspect.

Children 18:3:
They were definitely a lot of fun with David and Leemarie Hostetter running all over the place, and Seth Hostetter banging away on the drums.  The band on the whole is more energetic than on CD, which in itself made the songs more fun.  Seth even showed off by occasionally throwing one drumstick in the air and then catching it while not missing a beat.  David and Leemarie also had their funny moments up front.  David had a few one-liners, while Leemarie would occasionally take a moment to act very "girly" right after thrashing and headbanging.  Basically, the energy and entertainment value put this set a hair behind Paper Route's as my favorite of the night.  If it wasn't for some rougher-than-expected vocals at times, and Leemarie's occasional shrieking being a bit overwhelming, I would have enjoyed this set a little bit more.  That notwithstanding, it was very good.

I'll post set lists a bit later.  As for today, I'm most looking forward to Deas Vail late this evening.

ETA: Set Lists!

Denison Witmer: (I arrived 20 minutes late) "Your Friend", "California Brown and Blue", "Life Before Aesthetics", "Stations", "Carry The Weight", "One More Day", "Three Little Birds (Bob Marley Cover)

Submission Red: "Nobody", "The 10,000", (song I didn't recognize), "Good Enough", "Stand My Ground", "The Ticking Clock (Miss Understood)", "Signal The Smoke"

Paper Route: "American Clouds", "Wish", "Carousel", "Are We All Forgotten?", "Empty House", "Enemy Among Us", "Two Hearts" (new song), "Tiger Teeth", "You Kill Me", "Dance on Our Graves"
Encore: "Gutter"

Children 18:3: "Oh! Bravo.", "Cover Your Eyes"/"Whispering", "Homemade Valentine", "Stronger", (new song), "Samantha"/"Mock The Music", "LCM", "Bandits"/"Rains 'a Comin'", "Lost So Long"/"Balloons Reprise"

[murlough23]

Man, I would love to see Paper Route live.

[plvarona]

Wow.  I really feel way behind here.  Better to post this late than not at all.  Here were my brief impressions from my second day at Cornerstone.

The Air On Everest:
They are a relatively new pop-punk band, and they put together a solid show.  While there wasn't anything overly spectacular, they did a good job overall.

A Life Set Apart:
They're a group of 16-22-year-olds and there's quite a bit of talent in the group.  They have a female-fronted lead singer whose voice reminds me a little bit of Flyleaf's Lacey Moseley, and their instrumentalists were ripping through fast passages fairly easily, with their drummer especially impressing me.  They could still afford to clean up a few things musically and lyrically, but they have the potential to be quite good.

Children 18:3 (2nd show):
This show was pretty much on par with what I saw the previous night, except it was shorter in length.  This slot originally belonged to a band who had to pull out due to an injury to one of the members, and they let Children 18:3 have their slot after they pulled out.

The Letter Black:
They were pretty standard for female-fronted rock.  Nothing special, but nothing bad either.

Listener:
I checked them out upon recommendation from Paper Route's J.T. Daly.  Think of mewithoutYou with less heavy music here.  It's too bad the lyrics were drowned out by some screamo bands at some nearby stages, because the lyrics are their strongest point.

Ocean is Theory:
This was a pretty solid modern rock performance.  While they didn't stand out as well as other bands I saw, I still enjoyed their set.

Glenn Kaiser Band:
The members of this blues-rock band might be up in years, but they can still play quite well.  Rhythmically, the band was very tight, which made things quite fun.  Glenn also played multiple interested, all equally well.  Glenn also threw in humorous remarks between songs, making this a highly enjoyable performance.

SHIROCK:
Think U2 with more keyboards and a female background singer.  Energetic music, nice harmonization between husband and wife Chuck and Pap Shirock, and an uplifting message helped make this set one of the day's highlights for me.  The lyrics could use some work, but in a live setting that doesn't bother me unless they are extremely stupid, and they weren't quite that bad.  Still more to like than dislike here.  As a side note, I was able to talk to keyboardist Pap Shirock and bassist Kevin Whitsett for a little bit earlier in the day.  Both were very nice, and apparently they're friends with Paper Route.

Deas Vail:
This performance was up there with Paper Route as one of my favorites of the entire festival.  Rich instrumentation and excellent musical execution from start to finish helped to make this an enjoyable performance.  Some little twists in the instrumentation helped to spice things up, ranging from Wes Blaylock's tambourine playing on a few songs to a surprise appearance by Listener's Dan Smith in the middle of a song.  I also appreciated the harmonization between husband and wife Wes and Laura Beth Blaylock whenever they did it.  On an interesting note, a majority of the set came from their upcoming self-titled album, which is a bit of a risky move because they know the crowd will be hearing largely unfamiliar material.  However, the new songs I heard were so catchy, that the set was still very enjoyable anyway.  Among the older songs they played, they did give "Shoreline" a major face-lift.  On this version, the acoustic guitar is now the lead instrument, with the piano backing it up.  Additionally, Laura now sings the high part at the end of the song, with Wes doing a different counter-melody.  It was definitely a different version, but still beautifully done.  All of this helped close my second day at Cornerstone on a very high note.

I'll try to post my thoughts on my last day at Cornerstone before the end of this weekend.

Set Lists:

The Air On Everest: "A.O.E.", "Your Own Disaster", "9.81", "Doctor Dropout", "Say What You Will", "No Apologies", "The Hero", "Apathetic", "Until August Comes", "More Than Stone"

A Life Set Apart: (song I didn't recognize), "Take Me", "God's Armor", "Confession", "Play Something", "One Reason", "Phoenix"

Children 18:3: "All My Balloons", "Oh!  Bravo", "Cover Your Eyes"/"Whispering", "Stronger", "Samantha"/"Mock, The Music", "Bandits"/"Rains 'a Comin'", "Lost So Long"

The Letter Black: (I arrived 20 minutes late) "Believe", "Dream On" (Aerosmith cover), "Wounded", "Hanging On By a Thread"

Listener: Set concluded with "I Don't Want to Live Forever" and "Save Up Your Hopes Friends"

Ocean is Theory: "Underneath", "While We're Young", "King-Sized Bed", "Candlewood Lake", "Best Intentions", "Nervous Boy"

Glenn Kaiser Band: "Nobody's Fault But Mine", (song I didn't recognize), "Streetcorner Blues", "Nick of Time", "The Day Love Died", (song I didn't recognize), "What Can Be Shaken", "Runaway Train"

SHIROCK: "New Solution", "Time Goes By", "I'll Take Rain", "Drag You Down", "Still Young", "Calm Inside The Storm", (song I didn't recognize)

Deas Vail: "Birds", "Sixteen", "Bad Dreams", "Cages", "Quiet Like Sirens" (f/ Dan Smith of Listener), "Common Sense", "Shoreline", "Towers", "Meeting in Doorways", "Summer Forgets Me", "Wake Up and Sleep", "Desire", "White Lights" (encore)

[murlough23]

I'd love to hear that alt version of "Shoreline"; guess I have to hope it hits YouTube one of these days.

[plvarona]

I'd love to hear that alt version of "Shoreline"; guess I have to hope it hits YouTube one of these days.

That version certainly took me by surprise once I realized what they were doing.  As much as I would have loved to hear the original version in person, they did a pretty good job with the alternate version so I can't complain.

Might as well post my impressions of my third day at Cornerstone before it gets so late that I forget them.

On this day, I started the day by hanging out in the merchandise tent, and I ended up hanging around Glenn Kaiser's table for awhile.  He brought a few of his cigarbox guitars, and I thought it was interesting to hear him tell the stories of how he put them together.  As he put it, "If you mess up, it's no big deal because the materials were pretty cheap anyway."  I stuck around Glenn Kaiser's table so long that I missed the first half of the first artist I planned to see that day.

Timbre:
She's a harp player who has collaborated with some of the established acts in Christian rock, such as Cool Hand Luke and mewithoutYou.  For this performance, she brought in a whole ensemble that included a string quartet, a multi-person percussion section, and several wind instruments.  It was very mellow performance, and at the same time it was well-orchestrated, so I appreciated it for what it was.

River James:
This is a new band featuring the former lead singer of Army of Me on lead vocals, and Jacob Marshall, formerly of Mae, on drums.  They gave a pretty good first impression to the Cornerstone crowd as well.  I liked how they were able to lead equally well with the acoustic guitar and the piano.  Additionally, their sound has a driving feel to it, with Jacob Marshall contributing heavily to that.  Their guitarist also played his guitar with a bow on a few songs, and the guitar sounded a little bit like a cello when he did that.  I'm definitely keeping an eye on this band after this particular performance.

Lauren Mann and the Fairly Odd Folk:
This quartet from Canada turned in one of the most enjoyable performances of the day, highlighted by unique instrumentation and catchy tunes.  Lauren Mann played the piano for most of the show, although she played ukelele for one song.  Also part of the band was a banjo player who also played violin and xylophone, a cellist who also played acoustic guitar, and Lauren's husband on drums who also played several other percussive instruments.  It also helped that Lauren's songs were catchy in the first place, and the instrumentation made the songs stand out even more.  Lauren did mention that her new CD will be coming out in January, and if this performance is any indication, I'll be on the lookout for it.  As a side note, the banjo player had one of the most memorable sound check moments of the weekend.  When she was doing the sound check for the banjo, she sang Sufjan Stevens' "For The Widows in Paradise, For the Fatherless in Ypsilanti."  I clapped once I recognized what she was doing, and based on the reaction I heard from other parts of the crowd, apparently I wasn't the only one who recognized that song.

Sean Michel:
Sean is best known as the bearded guy who made it to Hollywood on American Idol five years ago, although he didn't make it to the voting rounds.  This was a stirpped-down performance with Sean, some of his friends, and a few of the other artists at the festival.  Sean's bluesy voice stood out here, and he had some pretty strong background singers accompanying him, especially one brunette woman who must've had a bit of Gospel training.  For an intimate, unplugged performance, this one went pretty well.

Photoside Cafe:
Think old-school Jars of Clay (circa their self-titled album) with more jam band tendencies and a full-time violinist, and you get the idea here.  Photoside Cafe's unique sound went over well in a live setting.  The violinist especially stood out here, whether it was him tearing through fast passages, adding an Eastern-sounding feel to a few songs, or plucking his strings on the closing song "Beautiful Release."  In terms of their live show, basically this is one of those bands that if you enjoy them on CD, you'll like them live because they sound good in concert.  They just weren't as dynamic as some of the other bands I saw this weekend, but their performance was still plenty enjoyable.

Psalters:
In terms of all-out fun, not many performances topped this one.  Think of nine men with lots of percussion and stringed instruments, ranging from different guitars to the violin.  This made the music have a bit of a tribal feel to it.  Almost everybody around me was dancing throughout this entire set, and quite frankly it was hard to keep yourself from moving.  As for the songs themselves, they were either taken from the psalms, or other verses straight out of the Bible, so it wasn't too hard to sing along.  In short, this was one of the out-of-the-box performances, but quite an entertaining one at that.

Seabird:
This piano-rock band has recently become a favorite of mine as of late, and they showed why during their performance.  Musically, the band sounds about as good as they do on CD, and they also did a good job building the songs up.  This allowed a few songs that I wouldn't have expected to be good live songs sound quite strong in concert.  While lead singer Aaron Morgan stayed behind a piano the whole concert, he still had plenty of energy, and I could even see his legs moving a lot while he was playing.  Aaron also told a few stories of past Cornerstone experiences, mostly as an attendee during his youth, and that was entertaining.  All of this added up to one of the strongest overall performances I attended this festival.  As a side note, I got to meet the band earlier in the afternoon, and they were all very nice.  I also arrived early enough to catch the sound check, and they even played a "bonus song" at the end of the sound check that they didn't play during their set.

Blindside:
Think lots of power and lots of energy, and you get the idea here.  Lead singer Christian Lindskog was the main attraction here, as he was running around practically the whole set.  Christian interacted with the crowd quite frequently, whether it was high fiving fans as he was walking by, or sticking the microphone into the crowd during the more popular songs.  Christian even walked into the crowd during the closing song, and had the crowd carry him for a few seconds before taking him back to the stage.  While the rest of the band was basically in the background the whole time, they provided strong support by keeping their energy level high themselves.  With of the action, there were a few off-notes here and there, but there was still a lot more to like than dislike here.

Anberlin:
This was the fourth time I've seen Anberlin live, and it was basically what I expected.  Stephen Christian ran around a lot, and there were a few rough moments in the beginning before the band worked it out and sounded strong at the end.  I would say the last five songs were among the most strongly played that I had heard the entire festival.  I did notice the rough parts lasted a bit longer than I've seen from Anberlin in the past, and they were most noticeable on "Pray Tell" when one of the guitarist badly missed a chord and didn't fix it for at least 10 seconds.  (That was particularly unfortunate, because that song had the potential to be a highlight given that some extra percussionists were invited onto the stage for that song.)  Interestingly enough, the sound problems seemed to be resolved right after the band slowed it down with the combination of "Art of War" and "Take Me (As You Found Me.)"  However, once the band hit their stride, they really nailed it.  This allowed them to finish the set (and for me the entire festival) on a very strong note.  As a side note, I found out after the set that Stephen's side project, Anchor & Braille, would be performing 45 minutes late, as opposed to the next day as had been originally scheduled.  If I wasn't flying out the following morning, I might have stuck around for that.

Cornerstone Festival would actually go on the next day, but I skipped out and flew back home.  By that time, I had already seen basically everybody I wanted to see anyway.

Set Lists:

Timbre: Her last two songs were an untitled song, and "Dawn Awakes"

River James: "Heart of Love", "In My Blood", "Fragile", "Dreams", "On My Way", "Don't Be Long", "Avenue A", "Arlington"

Lauren Mann and the Fairly Odd Folk: "Who's To Know", "Lady in the Yellow Dress", "All These Places", "I Lost Myself", "Let's Go Into The Unknown", (song I didn't recognize), "Lost in the Sound", "Stow Me Away"

Sean Michel: Set list included "This Little Light of Mine", "Wade in the Water" and "Amazing Grace"

Photoside Cafe: "Black Heart", "Don't Care", (new song), "Bittersweet Symphony" (The Verve cover), "Aftermath", "Welcome Home", "Kill Your TV", "Beautiful Release"

Psalters: Set list included "Psalm 27", "Hosanna", "Remember" and "Will Scarlett"

Seabird: "The Good King" (played during sound check), "Believe Me", "Let Me Go On", "This Road", "Don't Change a Thing", "Rescue", "'Til We See The Shore", "The Sound of You and I", "This Ain't Home", "Cottonmouth (Jargon)", "Don't You Know You're Beautiful"

Blindside: "Our Love Saves Us", "Caught a Glimpse", "Follow You Down", "My Heart Escapes", "All of Us", "My Alibi", "Fell In Love With The Game", "Withering", "The Way You Dance", "Pitiful", "Cute Boring Love", "Sleepwalking", "About a Burning Fire"

Anberlin: "Godspeed", "We Owe This to Ourselves", "Paperthin Hymn", "Never Take Friendship Personal", "Pray Tell" (f/ FallStar), "Readyfuels", "Art of War", "Take Me (As You Found Me)", "Enjoy The Silence" (Depeche Mode cover), "Impossible", "Dismantle. Repair.", "Closer", "Feel Good Drag"
Encore: "The Resistance"

[murlough23]

Just got my tickets to see Switchfoot and Anberlin at the Wiltern on October 11. When I saw that the two were touring together, I couldn't resist. It's been almost 4 years since I last saw Switchfoot, and while I think their setlists can be a bit too reliant on the obvious hits, they're still lots of fun. Similarly, Anberlin will be a good shot of energy even though their vocals aer pretty awful live. I don't know if anyone else is opening. I kind of hope they are because a friend attending the concert with us has to drive out from Riverside after work (ouch!)

[murlough23]

Fleet Foxes put on a solid show at the Greek Theater tonight. It was my first time seeing them live, and an outdoor venue was the perfect place for it - moon shining overhead, crickets chirping in the background, those pristine vocal harmonies echoing off into the clear night. Full setlist is in my main concert journal entry. I could go into a lot of detail, but just to summarize, I'll say that FF is capable of a wall of sound that packs a real punch, so it's not always the chill "acoustic sensitive" experience you'd expect, even though the live arrangements are mostly faithful to the album versions (with some variance in tempo for dramatic effects, usually during the harmony-heavy vocal breaks). The only thing I'd knock off points for - and only meager points at that - would be their awkward stage presence - little bits of funny between-song banter here and there, but it's a bit disruptive to the mood of their songs and you can tell they're trying to fill time while retuning (which they have to do a lot - they even opened with awkward silence and stage banter before getting tuned right for their first song). No biggie. When they're playing, they're awesome, and they hit pretty much every highlight from their past and present records that I could think of, with maybe "Drops in the River" being the one exception I would have liked to hear but didn't.

The Walkmen weren't that great of an opening band. The lead singer's a bit shrill, and I can't tell what sort of vibe they're going for - kind of surf, kind of oldies, but way stripped down, with a lot of songs that seem to lumber behind the pace they seem to want to have. They had a few moments of raw power that were impressive, but for the most part they kind of tried my patience. I'm sure they're good at what they do; it was just an odd fit for Fleet Foxes.

One of these days, I want a band called "The Eye" to open for Fleet Foxes, just so FF can start their set with "I was following The Eye..."

[bloop]

IDK, maybe it was an off night, but I'd hazard to guess The Walkmen just isn't a taste you've acquired yet.

On the other hand, some venues are just wrong for certain artists. I remember seeing PJ Harvey open for U2 years ago and, while she's a great artist (still has the best album this year, and the album she was supporting then was solid), the venues U2 tend to play just aren't ideal for her sound.

[murlough23]

IDK, maybe it was an off night, but I'd hazard to guess The Walkmen just isn't a taste you've acquired yet.

Some artists are probably better experienced on record as your first taste of them, rather than live. I've certainly seen a few bands live before where I got a negative impression of their live show, but then checked out one of their records for some reason anyway, and ended up liking them. Copeland comes to mind. (Though their live show was still terrible even after I decided I liked them in the studio.)

But yeah, the vibe I got from The Walkmen wasn't "these guys suck"; it was "This isn't really my thing." The crowd in general seemed appreciative.

[ajyouthguy]

Saw Needtobreathe with Ben Rector as opener tonight.  Very good show from both.  and a cool setting as it was at an outdoor amphitheater.

Here's Needtobreathe's setlist:

"Devil's Been Talkin'," "Prisoner," "Girl Named Tennessee," "Stones Under Rushing Water," "Drive All Night," "Something Beautiful," "Lay 'Em Down," "Outsiders," "Keep Your Eyes Open," "Washed by the Water," "Let us Love," "The Reckoning/Stuck in a Moment," "Place Only You Can Go/Stand by Me"

It's interesting looking at it now, because I didn't realize they did more from The Outsiders than from The Reckoning, although I did notice they didn't do two or three of the songs from The Reckoning that I really like ("Slumber," "White Fences" and "Learn to Love")

[murlough23]

David Crowder Band was phenomenal tonight on what is, sadly, their final tour. Though they opened with one new song, previewed another new one later in the set, and even rearranged into "bluegrass band form" for a rendition of "Go Tell It on the Mountain" from their new Christmas CD (as well as covers of "Because He Lives", "I Saw the Light", and "I'll Fly Away"), most of the set played like Crowder's greatest hits. That's to be expected given that their final album isn't in our hands yet (and sadly, most of it will be played live). "The Veil" was the first recognizable number, an interesting medley of "Shadows" (complete with a rap break from one of the guitarists) and "What a Miracle" came later in the set, and my absolute favorite Crowder song, "God Almighty, None Compares" appeared in its full seven-minute splendor about midway through. So I feel somewhat vindicated for missing out on the Church Music tour. The set was otherwise heavy on selections from A Collision and Illuminate (they brought "Intoxicating" back out to play, which was great fun except Crowder kept mixing up the words - embarrassing when you have them there on screen for everyone to sing!), while Remedy got the short shrift with only one song representing it ("The Glory of It All"), and Can You Hear Us? may as well have not existed. (OK by me - those are my two least favorite Crowder albums, and I caught the Remedy tour four years ago anyway.) I think it was a good balance of expected live show standards and interesting surprises. They mostly stick to the album arrangements, but they play them with gusto and since it's worship music it's easy for everyone to get into. Crowder always draws great crowds - one of the few times I can be in a very "churchy" concert atmosphere and not be at all bothered by it.

The setup wasn't as elaborate as the Church Music tour. No robot drummer, though mysteriously, there was this other guy with the same outfit, same hairdo, and about the same build as drummer B-Wack, who would show up to sit right next to him and add additional percussion. At first I honestly thought they were doing it with mirrors, but he would come and go as the songs demanded it. Crowder commented on it during one of his many mid-song asides (the band intentionally interrupted both "Intoxicating" and "You Are My Joy" just to shoot the breeze with one another and the audience for several minutes - odd, but kind of a running gag for them I guess), but never really explained it. No special guests except for the expected reappearance of John Mark McMillan to sing "How He Loves" at the end of the main set. (Michael Gungor also helped out on that one.) I was amused, since McMillan sang the bridge, that he and dang near everyone in the room sang "sloppy wet kiss" despite the lyric screen displaying Crowder's "unforeseen kiss" edit. It's all good.

The encore began with Crowder's biggest song, "O Praise Him (All This for a King)", which was weirdly enough introduced by the Sunsets & Sushi version's opening riff but otherwise played as expected. Then Crowder talked for a bit about the band's beginnings, how they started out by writing a song for their church service back home in Waco and promptly got told it only had three chords and repetitive words it sucked. Crowder sang the first verse of the song - which turned out to be "You Alone", and which everyone knew even though I don't think it's ever appeared in full form on any of Crowder's major-label albums. In that vein, the closing number was one from their indie days that I'd actually never heard and which I'm assuming was the title track from All I Can Say. It was an appropriately reflective and emotional moment, one last cry for God's help from a band that had been on an amazing journey that they were clearly thankful for, but that was also a bit weary and ready to get off the road as they closed the door on this entity known as the David Crowder Band.

Gungor's opening set was truly amazing - only six songs and only half the band (Michael and Lisa) were there to do an acoustic set. How do you do an acoustic set when you have as much ridiculous musical talent as these two? Bring along a beatboxing cellist, of course. Apparently the guy's a contestant on The Sing-Off this season? I think that's what they said. Anyway, the interplay between his beats, his cello and Michael's fast-fingered acoustic work was absolutely jaw-dropping on the opening number, "When Death Dies", which I hadn't even heard because I'm lagging behind on getting around to their new CD. (Must fix that in short order!) That and two other new songs - which I wasn't sure of the names of - showed of seriously fast fingerwork that rivaled Nickel Creek at times, and while Lisa Gungor might not be as quick-fingered, her glockenspiel and accordion were key elements of the sound (as was her voice). The new stuff complemented the three older songs that I did recognize, coincidentally my three favorite tracks from Beautiful Things - "The Earth Is Yours", "You Have Me", and "Beautiful Things". The first two of those are rather Future of Forestry-ish, in a good way, with a dose of Sufjan on "You Have Me" since its main instrument is the banjo. They were gorgeous and didn't lack a thing in the all-acoustic setting. "Beautiful Things" is their big hit and it got a lot of response - I've played the song to death by now, but I'll admit, it was still the most emotional moment of the evening (even more so than realizing I'll never see Crowder perform live again).

There were two openers before Gungor, which I thought was a bit excessive, but the tour had time management down to a science (good, since it was standing room only for over four hours). John Mark McMillan was up first, and while the guy's got a great deep voice and a no-nonsense rock style, I could tell he was a fish out of water, used to smaller stages. The stage presence needed work. He rambled for a bit about his new album getting pushed back to November 1, and him deciding November 1 was a date of great significance to him and the band, but never really explaining why. His songs were serviceable, with a few of the slower ones letting the raw emotion peek through above the "everyman heartland rock" sort of sound that he had going on. He's probably best appreciated on CD first, I guess. His set also felt complete without his signature song, but of course we all knew that was coming later.

Chris August was sort of a palette cleanser in between acts while the soundboards and such were being reset for the other bands - he played two songs all by his lonesome in between McMillan and Gungor, and then two more after Gungor. He was sort of the opposite from McMillan vocally - pretty boy band voice, genuine skills on the acoustic guitar, definitely knew how to get the audience on his side with his silly self-conscious ramblings in between songs. Musically I could definitely tell he had some soul and gospel influence going on, which kept him from straying too far into predictable, Phil Wickham territory. "Amen" was probably his most interesting song, sort of a slow Gospel romp with looped, distorted acoustic guitar as the backbeat and encouraged audience response to its simple chorus. My attention wandered a bit during his set, especially during his signature song "Starry Night" which seemed a little too K-Lovey compared to his other stuff, but the people seemed to love him and the guy's got charisma to spare.

[Ian]

I have seen 0 concerts this year

But I'm moving to Austin next week! (if i'm approved for the house)  So hopefully that should help my music life out

[murlough23]

Austin's a cool city. But I hear it has its limits.

[ajyouthguy]

Saw Mute Math live for the first time tonight.  Everything I had ever heard about their live show was very true...it was amazing in every way.  Interesting that they only did two songs off Armistice I think.  I loved watching their stage presence, all of them were so into every aspect of it.  And they are all wildly talented, playing multiple instruments, going from one to another in the middle of songs, three at a time playing percussion within songs, trading out with each other within songs, etc.  They came through the audience at the start of the show each playing some type of handheld percussion.  It was kinda humorous.

Set list:
Prytania
Blood Pressure
Spotlight
Tell Your Heart Heads Up
Allies
Reset
Odd Soul
Armistice
Walking Paranoia
One More
In No Time
Control
You Are Mine
All Or Nothing
Noticed
Typical

Encore:
Chaos
Break the Same
Quarantine

ended with some insane instrumental thing.  It was an awesome show.

[murlough23]

Mute Math always puts on an amazing show. I would have caught this tour if I wasn't already oversaturated with concerts this fall. I caught the Armistice tour and it was top-notch, and by the time I found out about the smaller venues on this tour, I figured I'd let someone else fight it out for tickets.

I'm willing to bet the near-absence of Armistice is because it wasn't as solid as the self-titled, the fans didn't respond to it as well, and even the band can see the mistakes they made on that record in hindsight. That being said, it was amazing stuff in a live setting.

I saw Switchfoot and Anberlin at the Wiltern tonight. It had been a good four or five years since I'd last seen either band. Both put on a solid, high-energy show - I think Anberlin's might have actually been better than Switchfoot. Both suffered from the rhythm section being so frickin' loud it was hard to hear the vocals and lead guitar... that might have just been the venue or our location within it. More details tomorrow, but I'd give both bands a solid B, possibly a B+ for Anberlin due to a surprise acoustic set in the middle.

[ajyouthguy]

I'm willing to bet the near-absence of Armistice is because it wasn't as solid as the self-titled, the fans didn't respond to it as well, and even the band can see the mistakes they made on that record in hindsight. That being said, it was amazing stuff in a live setting.

agreed...there were two or three other songs i thought would be cool to hear off that album live, but i wasn't upset that it got the short end of the straw because I like the other two albums a ton more.  Armistice was a disappointment to me initially, but I like it more now than I did then and it has actually grown on me lately.  But I will admit, it made me a little leery of Odd Soul initially because I was SO excited for Armistice when it finally came out and then let down.  I like Odd Soul a LOT more initially than I did Armistice. 

This was a small intimate venue and it was a great place to hear them. It was my second show there, the first being Robert Randolph back in May.  Both incredible live shows, both amazing in that setting, both well worth it, even though I went to both shows alone.

[murlough23]

Armistice has more of the catchy, melodic stuff, but plays it a little safe musically. (By MuteMath standards, anyway.) Its lyrics are also a bit of a downer. Odd Soul's more of a balance in the lyrics department (hard stuff vs. hopeful stuff) and is more experimental. So not as much is catchy right away, but over time you start to see the genius of it.

Expectations were different with Odd Soul because they weren't talking smack about embarrassing the self-titled; they just set out to make a different record, and they definitely pulled that off.

It would have sucked last night to be the rare Switchfoot fan who really liked Oh! Gravity and had never heard any of it live. The album may as well have not existed (along with anything before The Beautiful Letdown, but I've come to expect the latter these days). I get that it was unpopular with the fans, but I kinda thought the title track and especially "Dirty Second Hands" were live staples at this point. Guess I thought wrong. I saw them live twice in 2007, so no biggie for me.

Similarly, Anberlin's Blueprints for the Black Market doesn't seem to exist any more. Interestingly, Cities actually managed to squeeze more selections into their setlist than their current album did. I ain't complaining.

[murlough23]

Just got tickets for Jars of Clay's "Sing & Tell" tour, which is supposed to be an intimate, acoustic affair with audience Q&A and rare songs that they haven't played live in a while, if ever. Perfect for me because I was starting to get burned out on hearing them play the expected hits every single show (though to be fair, they've been pretty good about not being too predictable with this in recent years).

Also got a ticket for what looks like one of Sleeping at Last's only shows outside of Chicago in the near future - Hotel Cafe here in Hollywood. It's advertised as "An intimate evening with Ryan O'Neal" and will likely focus on the Yearbook stuff. Yeah, I like getting intimate with my favorite bands.

Here's my favorite of our pictures from the Switchfoot show. Being in the cheap seats way up in the mezzanine has its advantages.

[ewok20t3]

Last night I saw Thrice, La Dispute, Moving Mountains, & O'Brother in Covington, KY. O'Brother really took me by surprise. I had listened to them briefly a year or so ago and their music didn't immediately grab me. After seeing their fantastic live performance I'll definitely be revisiting their music. They were the opening band, and possibly the best live performers of the night.

Moving Mountains are one of my favorite bands, so needless to say, I very much enjoyed their performance. I'm sure some of their long-time fans were bummed that they only played one song from their beloved album, Pneuma. I love all of their music so I didn't have any complaints.

La Dispute come across better on record than in concert. That's pretty rare for a hardcore/post-hardcore band, but they are a story-telling band lyrically. It's hard to scream stories over post-hardcore music in a live setting, and be fully able to grasp the stories. The band had a good stage presence, but the lyrics are so intended to be the focus of this bands music, that it just doesn't work as well in a live setting.

Thrice were solid as usual. Probably half of their set was music from their latest two albums. They went back in time and played plenty of the old fast and heavy stuff, too, which is always fun in concert.

Overall, this is one of the most solid line-ups I've seen at a show in a long time.

[Ian]

La Dispute album was absolutely awful, but that might be because I prefer mewithoutyou by a large margin.

Had tickets to see MuteMath a couple weeks ago but I couldn't get a ride   I'll get another another chance in January.

Really want to see The National but tix are $70.  Forget that.

[ewok20t3]

La Dispute album was absolutely awful, but that might be because I prefer mewithoutyou by a large margin.

I definitely prefer mewithyou by a lot, as well. I didn't think La Dispute's album was great, but I thought it could have been pretty good if the frontman could write better lyrics.

[murlough23]

Jars of Clay played an acoustic set as part of their Sing & Tell tour at a church in my hometown of Pasadena, CA tonight. As much as I love Jars and I keep going to their shows year after year, there's been this growing dissatisfaction with their setlists over the years, as the expected radio hits and crowd-pleasers often show up but some of their deepest, most heartfelt songs (and even full albums) tend to get lost in the shuffle. This tour seems like it was explicitly designed for oddball fans like me who persisted in asking them annoying questions about why they never played certain long-lost album tracks. They managed to build a set that, at times, sounded what you might get if you told my iPod to play Jars of Clay songs on shuffle, though it did contain a few of their hits and was pretty well thought-out in general. Oh, and it was all acoustic, save for the occasional electric guitar ambiance from Steve or one song where Dan used a synthesizer. They had a cellist on stage and Dan sometimes played percussion, but aside from that it was just the gorgeousness of acoustic guitars, ukulele, keyboards, accordion, cello, and stronger harmony vocals than most of Jars' rock-oriented shows really have the time to showcase.

I'm too tired to gush about every song, but I will say that this longtime Jars fan was shocked in the best possible way to hear "River Constantine", "Eyes Wide Open", "Jealous Kind", "Scarlet", and "Water Under the Bridge" all for the first time live, as well as a few long-lost tracks that I'd heard live when they were new, but had quickly been forgotten since then. The setlist hit of least one song from all of their studio albums, save for Redemption Songs and Christmas Songs, which to be fair are mostly comprised of material written by others anyway. The intent was to focus on songs they had written that still meant something to them and to curious fans who had asked about them. But shoot, even the hits sounded reinvented and reinvigorated in acoustic form (except perhaps for "Flood" and "Liquid", which instead sounded closer to the album versions since there was a cello onstage to cover the string parts, but I hadn't heard them sounded like that in ages, so that's cool). I could probably still come up with a list of songs a mile long that I wish they'd played, but I can't think of the last concert by Jars or by any band I've seen live more than once where the setlist was constantly surprising and thoroughly unpredictable.

Humor was also a big part of the evening, too. Opening acts Dave Barnes and Andrew Ripp had vocal chops and fast fingerwork, but it was their witty quips that really had the audience eating out of the palms of their hands in between songs - or during, in the case of Andrew Ripp somehow managing to work covers of The Guess Who's "American Woman" and Eminem's "Lose Yourself" (yeah seriously, covering Eminem in a church, who'd have thought?) into a medley with one of his original songs. At times I was convinced that Dave Barnes could have been a stand-up comedian who happened to have written a few songs on the side. As for Jars, I've long enjoyed Dan's deadpan remarks in between songs on stage, which are often riddled with awkward pauses and weird asides from the other band members that couldn't have been rehearsed. It's a reminder that they don't take themselves too seriously, even when discussing the history of a song that means a lot to them and to the audience.

Setlist is in my main Concert Journal entry, as always. This will be the live performance to beat for 2011 - and to be fair, with 36 new songs to choose from, Sleeping at Last could well have a shot at it next month.

(Also, full disclosure: I teared up quite a bit during "Safe to Land". I've always loved the song, but it's gained new depths for me this year.)

[Ian]

This weekend I will be seeing Brandt Brauer Frick, M83, Girls (ick), Lykke Li, sthingy, Boris and Russian Circles!  Probs will get to catch a bit of Donald Glover as well :D

[Ian]

i missed boris D:

everyone else was great though, except for girls obviously.  even their fans were too busy chatting and smoking to watch the stage.  what a hideous band.  strangely though they have a couple really good songs which kind of makes me hate them more for complicating my life

oh and i caught a bit of tune-yards, shapes have fangs and youth brigade

[Ian]

Radiohead is playing in Austin this March!  Will be my first chance to see them! :DDD

[murlough23]

Saw Sleeping at Last at the Hotel Cafe tonight. Can a concert be good but also a bit of a letdown? That's sort of how I feel about this one. SAL made the transition to a one-piece this year, and the show was billed as "An intimate evening of music with Ryan O'Neal", so I wasn't expecting full band splendor, but I guess I still thought there'd be fuller arrangements since he had hired a cellist, an electric guitarist, opening act David Hodges to play piano, and a few female vocalists he met on the recent mini-tour for the Breaking Dawn soundtrack. Most of these people were only on stage for a handful of songs, not all of them in a row, so there was a lot of shuffling around, awkward segues, and general inefficiency. A setlist that flows well has honestly never been SAL's strong suit. They hit a lot of my favorites from Yearbook, plus a few oldies (though nothing from Ghosts), plus the inevitable Twilight song, "Turning Page" (which I was hearing for the first time, and I'll admit, it's pretty good).

All in all, I'd say most of the songs translated well live. At a few points I felt like they needed a percussionist or more than two or three people onstage to give a few of them a fuller sound. To be fair, there's such a wide variety of instruments on Yearbook that I knew there'd be no way to recreate everything faithfully in a live setting. I was just hoping for clever re-arrangements rather than understated ones, I guess. Subbing in the cello for clarinet on "Silhouettes", or the piano for harp on "Next to Me", or the electric guitar for keyboards on the old favorite "Umbrellas" was interesting, but there were other times when I felt the supporting players on stage were doing too little. Maybe it's best that my favorite piece from Yearbook, "Atlantic, The Sea of Atlas", was not attempted. I can't see how that would work with a minimal arrangement. They had the cello, piano and ukulele all available, but I can understand how the setlist was limited due to a short amount of time available to work out rehearsals with all of the players involved.

But I'll commend Ryan for stepping out on his own and losing the reliance on pre-recorded arrangements. SAL's old shows, even though they were a full three-piece back in the day, would still pipe in the string arrangements and occasional bits of programming from the albums. This time it was all live, all organic. It may have made some of the songs less majestic, but it was arguably a more honest approach. The crowd was amazingly supportive, so perhaps most of the audience prefers SAL this way. (It was fun to hear a few of them debating behind me about how they appreciated the Twilight song and the guest vocalists whose other songs on the soundtrack Ryan kept gushing about, but were conflicted because they couldn't bring themselves to support the franchise).

David Hodges (former keyboard player for Evanescence, though he's been around the block a few times since then as a songwriter-for-hire and doing his own solo stuff) opened the show with a brief four-song set. He was OK. Great voice, and he harmonized well with his right-hand man on the guitar, but a lot of the songwriting struck me as rather flat and cliched. I was honestly surprised that, despite him joining SAL on stage for three songs, "Accidental Light" was not performed, since Hodges sang on the studio version of that one.

There was another band performing when we first arrived at the venue, called Vital. They were not on tour with SAL, and it was just coincidental that they had the earlier slot that evening. Imagine a dude sporting dreadlocks with a reggae voice fronting a very poppy rock band, but not in a "crunk rock" sort of way, and you kind of get the picture. They were very energetic and fun, with one hell of a drummer, and a keyboardist doing odd things like playing the keys with drumsticks. A chill, dark club with people seated at tables ordering whiskey sours probably wasn't the best venue for them, since they gave off more of a "4 PM at your local underground rock festival" sort of vibe. At one point they covered Coldplay's "Don't Panic" out of left field, and it got a few cheers of recognition. I'm not sure how well it worked, but it at least says something about their unwillingness to be easily classified.