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Tweedy opens up at Hogg
Hot on the heels of a night of playful back-and-forth with the audience on Tuesday, Jeff Tweedy returned for more of the same Wednesday night. And then some.
Tweedy kicked off the sold-out show with the cautiously hopeful alt-cowboy song/query “(Was I) In Your Dreams.” He then fought through the first of what would become an onslaught of audience outbursts and moved into “Sunken Treasure,” a song that worked well to showcase a voice that seems to have grown significantly stronger since the Wilco frontman put down the American Spirits and took up jogging.
After displaying some fine dexterity with his picking on an Uncle Tupelo classic, “Wait Up,” Tweedy let the audience know that he was in the mood for another healthy dose of the playfulness he exhibited Tuesday night. He offered up a classic open-mawed scream pose for those in the audience who were desperately trying to take pictures of their hero singer-songwriter. He described the pose as, “The only picture I’ve ever seen of me in a newspaper,” and then implored the audience to put away their cameras so we could all enjoy the rest of the show. After the flashes died, the Bud Light-pounding girl to my left finally retrieved her camera and snapped a few shots. My skin crawled and stomach tightened, a reprimand from the notoriously moody performer was imminent, I was certain. “Was that a flash?” he asked incredulously. Following a brief smirk, the potential meltdown averted, Tweedy continued his set with a beautifully stripped-down “Muzzle of Bees.”
Tweedy went on to entertain the mildly annoying crowd with songs ranging across the spectrum of his sizable catalogue — playing tunes from each of the Wilco albums — including a song (“Not for the Season”) from the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Demos — along with songs from his two side projects, Loose Fur and Golden Smog.
Seeing a Tweedy, or Wilco, show generally poses one of two seriously problems for me. Either Tweedy will be surly and frustrated with a chatty crowd and pontificate about our need to subjugate our individual needs of self-expression and gratefulness, or, as was the case Wednesday night, he will engage the crowd with his banter, which in turn gives the audience the impression they’ve been given carte blanche to be obnoxious. I think I prefer the former. It can grate watching the self-admittedly neurotic performer chide an audience, but it is much more of a beating when he interacts excessively, as it leads to an unfortunate barrage of requests, admissions of love and horrible attempts at humor from the audience. I know adoration and booze can be an elixir that easily compels open expression, but can’t people remain relatively silent for 90 minutes? If Wednesday night was any indication, apparently not.
But I don’t mean to be a curmudgeon. I had a wonderful time, and although Tweedy’s stage chatter may have led to unnecessary admissions and requests from his devotees, it also offered some wonderful insight into one of the best songwriters of the past 25 years.
Tweedy discussed his notorious neurosis with the adoring crowd. “I’m super neurotic. You mighta figured that out,” he admitted. “I’ve got a problem, and it’s you. It’s you liking me a little bit.”
A young lady responded forcefully, “We love you,” to which Tweedy could only respond, “See, that’s worse. Now I don’t trust you.” Now that’s sharing. “I said we are gonna rap about our feelings and I meant it. And sometimes it hurts,” he later confessed jokingly. Talk about sharing.
Wednesday night he shared stories, laughs and some beautiful tunes spanning the last two decades. So, maybe the audience shared a little too much, as well, but if it didn’t bother Tweedy, I guess I won’t let it bother me.
Jeff Tweedy at Hogg Auditorium 1.24.07
Set List
- “(Was I) In Your Dreams” (“Being There”)
- “Sunken Treasure” (“Being There”)
- “Wait Up” (“March 16-20, 1992” - Uncle Tupelo)
- “Muzzle Of Bees” (“A Ghost is Born”)
- “At My Window Sad and Lonely” (“Mermaid Avenue”)
- “Not For the Season” (“Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Demos”)
- “Box Full of Letters” (“A.M.”)
- “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart” (“Yankee Hotel Foxtrot”)
- “Radio King” (“Down by the Old Mainstream” - Golden Smog)
- “You Were Wrong” (“Loose Fur” - Loose Fur)
- “How to Fight Loneliness” (“Summerteeth”)
- “Bob Dylan’s 49th Beard” (“More Like The Moon”)
- “Heavy Metal Drummer” (“Yankee Hotel Foxtrot”)
- “The Late Greats” (“A Ghost is Born”)
Encore 1:
- “California Stars” (“Mermaid Avenue”)
- “A Shot In The Arm” (“Summerteeth”)
- “Jesus, Etc.” (“Yankee Hotel Foxtrot”)
- “ELT” (“Summerteeth”)
Encore 2 (sans PA).
- “Dreamer In My Dreams” (“Being There”)
- “Acuff-Rose” (“Anodyne” - Uncle Tupelo)
Permalink | Comments (2) | Post your comment | Categories: Music
Comments
By Lacey
January 31, 2007 02:40 PM | Link to this
Hooray, the MO lives!
By cathleen
January 31, 2007 10:13 PM | Link to this
great write up on the show… and thanks for posting the set list!