Railroad Earth at The Showbox

Silvie and I caught the band Railroad Earth at The Showbox on Saturday, September 25. These guys have been together for a decade, but I just heard of them a couple of months ago. I saw their picture on Jambase and decided to You Tube them. I was hooked after the first tune. I played a few more and decided within that half-hour or so that I loved these guys. That day, I ordered tickets to this show and preordered their upcoming ablum (on vinyl) from their website. I would describe them as a bluegrass jamband. They mix traditional tunes with well-crafted originals. At their shows you'll hear reels, foot-stomping bluegrass and Dead-like improvisation that stretches some of their tunes out past the 10-minute mark. Sil and I spent the first set just two feet from the stage but with all the dancing and crowding it got a bit too intense and over-heated for me. We moved to the back of the small room for the second set where we could breathe some relatively fresh air and not fear the elbows of the more exuberant twirlers. It was a fantastic show. Highlights for me were many: "Like a Buddha", Tom Waits' "Cold Water", "The Forecast", the Waterboys' "Fisherman's Blues" and my new favorite RRE tune "Seven Story Mountain".

Here is the setlist:

Set 1:

Long Walk Home

Like a Buddha

Walk Beside Me

Cold Water

The Forecast

Lone Croft Farewell

Cuckoo's Medley

Set 2:

Saddle of the Sun

Seven Story Mountain

RV

Colorado

Black Elk Speaks >

1759

Fisherman's Blues

Happy Song

Jupiter and the 119

Encores:

Bird in a House

Little Rabbit

Furthur at Marymoor Park

Silvie and I went to see the band Furthur at Marymoor Park on Saturday, 9/18. Furthur is Bob Weir and Phil Lesh from the Grateful Dead, along with Jeff Chimenti on keyboards, Joe Russo on drums, Sunshine Becker and Jeff Pehrson on backing vocals, and, crucially, John Kadlecik on vocals and guitar. Kadlecik is the key addition to the latest post-Jerry version of the Dead. He was at the helm of Dark Star Orchestra, the leading GD tribute band, and offers a half-decent approximation of Jerry's guitar style. Vocally, he's in the ballpark as well. I had listened to a little of the Furthur live offerings on GD Radio and other sites, and felt that John (as well as the others) were really doing the old GD chestnuts justice, so I decided to put aside my 15-year old "No Jerry? No Way!" attitude and plunked down the dough for the tickets.

It was a coolish day, and it rained steadily throughout the entire show, easing up only briefly during the setbreak. This situation, typically, did little to dampen the spirits of those in attendance. I expected a mix of old and young, crunchy and yuppie, and that's what we got. The crowd was into it, and the band was very good, indeed. Just as soon as I heard the opening notes of "Half-Step" as we entered the venue, I realized just how much I had missed this music in a live setting. It was a really fine show, and I had more fun seeing Furthur than I ever had at any Phish show. Phil and Bobby are getting up there, but both are still showing up and laying it down, and the rest of the band really cooks. It basically amounts to a cover band with two original members, but it's a truly effective celebration of what I consider to be some of the best music ever. I hope these guys come around again. Here is the setlist:

Set 1

Mississippi 1/2 Step

Stagger Lee

Pride of Cucamonga

Promised Land

Sittin' on Top Of The World

Peaceful Valley

Till Morning Comes

Sugaree

Set 2

Dear Mr. Fantasy

Cassidy

So Many Roads

High on a Mountain

The Wheel

Fire on the Mountain

Death Don't Have No Mercy

I Know You Rider

Going Down The Road Feelin' Bad

And We Bid You Goodnight

Encore: One More Saturday Night

Bumbershoot 2010

Sil and I went to Bumbershoot on Saturday, the main draw being Bob Dylan headlining the mainstage at 9:00. In order to not run out of fuel before then, we decided to get there around 3:00. We ate some soba noodles and checked out the Flatstock concert poster exhibit. Dave's Killer Bread had a booth outside of Flatstock, and I grabbed a couple samples of Sin Dawg while Silvie bought a few loaves to take home. She also got a cool DKB tote and kids' activity book (!) and we saw Dave himself inside Flatstock.

Just beyond the DKB booth there was a stage where some guys called the Budos Band were funkin' it up. They were great, probably the best act I saw that day (although we only really caught two others). We headed to another stage to watch Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros, but the tight lawn space was completely full with more people streaming in, so we decided to head for the stadium where Neko Case was already playing. We had seen Neko the year before, when she was opening for Lucinda Williams. She was just fine, nothing too grand.

Bob came on pretty much on time and played 14 songs, mixing oldies with newer tunes, hitting the Highway 61 album particularly hard (he played 5 of the album's 9 songs, including a slightly truncated Desolation Row). It had been about 16 years since I'd seen Dylan last, and it was nice to see that mostly he's still operating under the same M.O. He has a great back-up band to make up for his increasingly rusted-chainsaw vocals and he is still tweaking his old tunes, changing their melodies ever-so-slightly to breathe some new life into them. I though that the arrangements of the two Blood on the Tracks tunes (Tangled and Simple Twist) were particularly sweet. I remember at the Dylan shows I saw in the 90s how you would have to sort of lean forward and cock your head in concentration during the intros to pick out the tunes, and often you would have to wait for the lyrics before you got them. I remember hearing a moving re-imagining of "Pretty Peggy-O" which I'd dearly love to hear once again. Well, Bob is still Bob, although these days he's really talking more than actually singing. I was content to head out early before the encore (the inevitable "Like A Rolling Stone") and I don't think Bob's kind of show belongs in the headlining role in a stadium (although this was reportedly the first time the mainstage had ever been sold out for Bumbershoot). But it was nice to see him again, after all these years, and it was nice to have Silvie there too (who had fun keeping the setlist as I fed her the titles, once I'd recognized the songs). Here was the setlist:

Rainy Day Women #12 and 35
Don't Think Twice, It's Alright
Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
Just Like A Woman
Rollin' and Tumblin'
Desolation Row
Cold Irons Bound
Tangled Up In Blue
Highway 61 Revisited
Simple Twist Of Fate
Thunder On The Mountain
Ballad Of A Thin Man
Jolene
e: Like a Rolling Stone

DKB in the house

Budos Band

During the Budos Band set I noticed funny man Doug Benson checking out the show. Dude seemed really high.

Memorial stadium filling up during the Neko Case set

Bob, working the crowd in his mariachi suit