Concert Reviews, Photos, Videos and Rock and Roll Stories from fans who love live music

Friday Nov. 7th presented the practicing concertaholic  2 big choices of either the sonic boom of AC/DC at the Rogers Centre with 44,999 other delirious fans or Daniel Lanois at a tiny obscure venue 1.5 hours south west of Toronto that seats about 300. It really wasn’t too hard a choice for me. I will take the opportunity to witness musical genius over a stadium blast anytime. (fortunately both bands are playing again very soon in Toronto and on different days)

The venue for Daniel Lanois had been moved at the last minute from the Old Roxy Theatre in Mount Forest Ontario to an even smaller, positively more obscure venue because of construction outside the Roxy. I guess the last minute change and possibly the steady downpour threw some people off because there were maybe only 150 people present in this hundred and something year old building. I had a nice 6^th row seat anyway but I couldn’t help myself and moved up to the 3^rd row centre when I realized the show about to begin and the entire row was still empty.

Lanois rolls right into The Messenger. He is wearing black leather jacket, black t shirt, black ball cap, his black hair all grown out and sporting a black bushy beard. The dark feel and look is contrasted sharply and amazing well by his 1956 Goldtop Gibson. The lighting is very subdued, everything is subdued and it fits. The theatre is small with the sloping floor, arched ceiling, small balcony and plush red velour seats that really help out the acoustics in these small older theatres. The acoustics are excellent. We are all at the sound board seat. The back drop is a small to medium sized screen that has the band projected on to it in black and white. It is continuous live shot as there is video camera guy moving about.

The music is so “take me away time” The Maker…. Still Water … Danny always a story teller talks a bit about the Grand River and his friends / compadres on the reserve while rolling out this tune.

He is playing with a nice tight band which he kindly intros. This is a pretty bare bones set up. He is using a couple of microphones and the main one looks like a vintage microphone.  He does some heavy tunes with the full band and does a really nice solo set. We get Jolie Louise, Rocky World, Under The Stormy Sky like Bang! Bang! Bang! All played in the solo set.  Highlights for me are probably the opening few songs, the solo set and the songs Fire and Slow Giving. Yes, basically the whole show.

I love the stories. Before he does a tune on his pedal steel he tells the crowd he has a soft spot for the country sound and continues sharing a story about street playing in Toronto near several different bars and mentions going into one watching a musician playing a pedal steel. He told the musician he wanted to learn how to play the pedal steel.  At another juncture he talks about riding his motorcycle through these dusty concession roads and the hidden beauty of these places. He mentioned the theatre in particular. I recall at another point him talking about the perfect egg. Fry the egg don’t cook the yok and place on a slice of bread with butter. He followed this by welcoming everyone to the Lanois cooking show.

It really felt like there were only 11 people here.  He had a conversation with a couple he knew from the area from the stage that went on for a few minutes, it kind of talking back and forth and the crowd was so small neither him or the couple had to talk very loud to hear each other.

Luckily enough I hung around after the show to get a good look at the Gibson Goldtop and to see if I could score a setlist. Danny came out pretty much right away and was talking to a few people that were waiting for him. There were maybe 7 of us at this point. I asked him if I could get a picture with him and if I could get the inner sleeve of my Acadie CD signed. He happily said no problem to both. Unfortunately the picture came out a little blurry but you can still make out who it is.

The only thing I really missed was some of the pushing, feedback laden, futuristic, cutting edge, stretching it out there, awesome sounding guitar work I caught doing a couple of years at The Great Hall on Queen St. Toronto and Hamilton Place Theatre. He just really kept that to a very bare minimum. Ah! I can only hope for Steamdog at Massey Hall this coming Friday Nov. 14th.

The entire set was kind of short but the combination of a tiny crowd, a great obscure venue and the magic of Daniel Lanois both musically and storytelling- wise, made this a very satisfying trip for a concertaholic like me.

Todd

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With this show in Hamilton at Copps Coliseum I felt it it kind of flew under the radar for me since I did not have a ticket yet and wasn’t 100% sure I was going. It seemed weird having The Who in Hamilton versus Toronto. I made the trip from Toronto a grabbed a single ticket in the 9th row. The fun begins…

I helped a family I had met online who was coming to the show get the $9 parking and then met up with them inside to chat about their trip from Rochester, NY. An obvious Who fan and mother of 2, she brought her 10 year old daughter and 15 year old son to witness one of the greatest Rock Bands on the planet do what they have been doing for 4 decades. Play Rock Anthems.

Once inside I hung out around the soundboard at the rear floor and looked closely as the lighting technicians set up. There it is… “the setlist” … camera out and I took a photo of it and then later another shot over a couple of shoulders… just in case I didn’t get the actual setlist in hand after the show. Here I crossed paths with another serious concertaholic who goes by the handle the original kid rock. We chatted for a few minutes and I took a shot of the pass on his jacket as he staggered away.

9:05pm. The Big Screen lights up and The Who take the stage and they take us for an immediate trip down memory lane with Can’t Explain. I loved hearing “Seeker” and watching Pete Townsend all bundled up in a trench coat and scarf as if he hadn’t quite warmed up yet. The first 5-7 rows down front were dancing and in the aisles no where near their seats… me included. That ended with security cleaning up and interupting my first video “Who Are You”.. which was ok because I got a little smile as I looked in front of me as the 10 & 15 year old along with their mother were being escorted back from being right down front instead of following rules back at their 17th row seats.. Way to go!

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One of the unexpected highlights for me in this show was during the performance of “Real Good Looking Boy“. As much of a Who fan as I am… I just didn’t seem to recall this song… From Roger’s intro mentioning the obvious nod to Elvis to the powerful clips of The King himself on the screen as young man. The lyrics got me imagining a younger “WHO”… I saw Elvis and thought about his death, then glanced over at where The Ox… John Entwistle would be standing as Pino Paladino held down the right wing on bass… it was just one of those moments where you think you know a song and even if you do…it sounds like the first time for some reason. This song was just perfect. Right On!

The pace kept up as Baba O’Reilly (video) and Pete’s Windmill factory got going along with the crowd sing-a-long and harmonica of course from Roger. This was followed by Getting In Tune which I really enjoyed as it reminded of listening to Who’s Next over and over again back in the late 90’s when I discovered that Album over again through some friends. The Song Is Over was another favourite off that album. Here is the Getting In Tune video…

The band really leaned into 5:15 and the audience was responding in various ways from yelling lyrics, screams and one guy was throwing his chain-smoking girlfriend in the air for the entire back half of the show….plus the super fast video of the traintracks worked well. With Eminence Front next… these classic rock moments were making the string of songs..fly-by. It was so good to see this band again. Up close too! “My Generation” featured some fun bass from Pino and more and more of the excellent drumming we witnessed for the entire set by Zak Starkey. Then the finale of “Won’t Get Fooled Again” The energy level climbs up another notch on and off the stage for this one.

So the band comes back on stage for the encore and Roger & Pete start to talk about how quickly the band returns to the stage versus the rituals of the 60’s, 70’s etc. He said they had more things to do back then and Pete mentions possibly not having any equipment left to even play back then… Here is the conversation and …it leading into “Naked Eye”

Pinball Wizard was another singalong with more visuals on the screens but what happened next was worth the trip from Toronto and the ticket price for sure… according to a fan on the another forum we headed into a medley of Overature/Amazing Journey/Sparks/Underture/We’re Not Going to Take It…. and somewhere inside here it appeared Mr Townsend was going to put on a little clinic with is red axe…. so I zoomed in and started to film… for 6+ minutes..

There isn’t alot to say after watching that video… the party-lady beside me turns to me after experiencing this and musters up the best sentence she could to saying “you have to send me a copy of this”….. That is me yelling in the background at the guy beside say “unbelievable”… “deadly”… thanking the guitar gods for sending me to this show. This is Pete Townsend…this is The Who…. “See Me, Feel Me” and “Listening To You” was one big “love-in”… barely enough to slide down off that guitar solo.

At this point I actually left my row and headed back to the soundboard at the rear-floor area. So I watched Pete and Roger do the one song I knew was left on acoustic guitars… TEA and THEATRE. Beautiful.

I watched the lights come on. I watched the lighting tech’s sigh to each other on another show well done… I locked in on that setlist again… waiting as the tech shut down the 2 apples… he glanced over to his left… I was there… “Could I have one of those setlists“…as I pointed.. he looked at his partner for approval, he nodded, he handed it to me, I nodded back.

Long Live Rock

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If you look closely at this setlist and the one I got a photo of above ..they are different. The other one is actually Toronto and this one below that got handed to me I believe is Detroit with changes made.

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….I had been oscillating between going and not going to this show right up to the last minute for no other reason then I wasn’t feeling so hot. Needless to say I ended going and after a couple of songs I knew I had made a wise decision.

This show kind of felt like “An Evening with” and a little bit “story-teller” like.  Lindsay Buckingham hit the boards somewhere around 8:30PM and did 2 songs right off the bat from his new album Gift of Screws. I had never been a Lindsey Buckingham fan. I had never really not, been a fan. I just never really paid much attention. Last night all that changed! 2 songs into the show I was mesmerized by his style of guitar playing. This guy is a master at picking. I think throughout the whole show he may have used a guitar pick on 2 songs. The third song in is an older solo tune called Trouble. Even if I hadn’t been paying much attention to his solo material I knew the song and it had me thinking Oh! Yeah! This is a really good song!

Lindsey is touring with some excellent seasoned musicians that really accent his playing and they harmonize perfectly with his vocals. The harmonizing had me thinking of bands like the Eagles, Poco and even a little CSN to name a few.

You would have had to be in coma through the mid to late seventies and early eighties not to have been aware of Lindsey Buckingham’s contribution to Fleetwood Mac, having written some of the most recognizable songs from this or any era. Not to mention being a lot of the genius behind one of the best selling albums of all time. Just amazing stuff when you think about it!!

The first Fleetwood Mac song we get is Tusk. This is definitely the longer album version of the song, not the radio shortened one I had heard so much. The sound is so good in this great old theatre. I have to say the equipment is state of the art all around. The clarity of music is amazing. The custom guitars are a show in themselves. He relied on 3 main axes, all of which are beautiful custom pieces.

This rolled us into a solo acoustic set that was quite beautiful by every measure. The highlight by far for me was the Fleetwood Mac song Never Going Back Again. He brought the vocal down to whisper and I swear you could have heard a pin drop, the place was that quiet! What a respectful response from this crowd!

Let the story telling begin. Lindsey rolls out Big Love with a story of how he really was not looking for love as much as looking out for love as he gestures a pushing away motion with his hand. He explains this was just before he walked away from “the insanity” that was going on all around Fleetwood Mac. He said there were just so many people ignoring the responsibility of spouses and family he had to get away from it. He went on to talk a bit about his 11 year married relationship and his 3 children.

The set was easily 21+ songs. I tried to get a setlist but the setlists were laminated so the tech told me “no way” and “this is mine”. This tells me by this point in the tour the songs are pretty much etched in stone and there isn’t much deviation from start to finish. I did manage to score a guitar pick and the coolest thing about it is the pick has a dark guitar with the do not use symbol over top. The inside joke I guess is a laugh at not using a pick for the most of the shows.

Before rolling out the title track Gift of Screws Lindsey went on to explain that the meaning of the album and song title was taken from an Emily Dickinson poem. The meaning isn’t as crude as it may sound as Lindsey put it, rather it refers to a flower press (like a wine press I guess) to extract oils etc.

More of the story-teller feeling was conveyed when Lindsey explained how he felt writing and playing solo material. He continued telling us about the difference in support an artist receives when rolling out material for a “brand” name such as Fleetwood Mac as apposed to doing his solo material. Although he did say he was pleasantly surprised from the reaction Warner Brothers Records gave him regarding his new album. They had even picked a single out for release and he made us laugh when he smirked and said “what’s that” in reference to hearing a single had been picked. I guess since the Mac days he hadn’t needed to worry about the “machine” choosing singles for him. The single he referred to is the song Do You Miss Me, which he promptly played.

A lot of the last 2 albums got an airing as did a couple more Fleetwood Mac tunes.  Of the Fleetwood Mac tunes, Go Your Own Way was a killer! As the song kicked in a lot of the crowd just kind of oozed down the aisles to stand at the stage front where Lindsey began letting a bunch of fans slap the strings on his guitar. I love this kind of stuff!!

All in all it was a really good show and by far highlights for me were the exposure to Lindsey Buckingham’s awesome style of picking / playing coupled with his unique singing voice, the harmonizing, the story telling, hearing the Fleetwood Mac material live and his custom guitars.

SETLIST FOR DANFORTH MUSIC HALL FOR OCTOBER 8, 2008

Main set:

Great Day / Love Runs Deeper / Trouble / Go Insane / Tusk / I Know I’m Not Wrong / Gift of Screws / Never Going Back Again / Big Love / Shut Us Down / Under the Skin / It Was You / Did You Miss Me / Come / World Turning / I’m So Afraid / Go Your Own Way

Encore:

Second Hand News / Don’t Look Down / Treason

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