Even a perfunctory scan of the cyberwebs will lead you to hundreds of blog posts and professional reviews raving about the genius of Ryan Adams. His three-night run at NYC’s Town Hall
Rapid Fire Review Week continues with HT’s favorite Disco Biscuits Diehard Matt Quinn’s review of this weekend’s two Hammerstein shows:
It’s been a long year for The Disco Biscuits. With “new” drummer Allen Aucoin at the kit, virtually every fan of the band agrees that they are playing with the kind of vigor and creativity that’s been absent since the end of 2002.
Sure there were the brief flashes of greatness in the ’03-’05 era. But for the most part it was directionless and unfocused, a band very unsure of where it was going, a band running out the clock on its first incarnation. After an adequete NYE run, a short spring tour and a summer spent on the festival circuit, the Biscuits’ fall tour has seen them firing on all cylinders in venues across the country, and the shows at the Hammerstein Ballroom on 11/24 & 11/25 were certainly no exception.
The first night opened with a section that featured exactly the type of setlist creativity Biscuits fans have been craving. The Overture is normally a tightly composed, classical style piece that features a trance jam in the center of it. In lieu of the trance this night, the Biscuits dropped into a 30-second composed segment of Little Lai, then a 30-second composed segment of Bazaar Escape, then a 30-second composed segment of House Dog Party Favor, then directly into an entire Bach Invention (#13 in A Minor, to be exact), then picked up the end of The Overture where the trance section would normally end.
The entire segment was obviously rehearsed, and rehearsed well. There was no jamming between the segments; they were played as though it were one giant composed piece. Apparently the setlist had this labeled as “The OverBerzerk,” but I’ve taken to caling it “The Berzerkerture.” I just think it rolls off the tongue better. Whatever you want to call it, it was well-planned and flawlessly executed.
Read on for the rest of Quinn’s stellar review and download his recordings from both the 11/24 and 11/25 Hammerstein shows…
Rapid Fire Review Week continues with Hidden Track senior hipster correspondent Luke Sacks’ account of Wilco‘s 11/24/06 show…
Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy recently decked a fan that happened to be dumb enough to jump on stage, getting a little too close for comfort. That solitary action must have released years of hostility, because on Friday night at Chicago’s Auditorium Theater, Tweedy and his Wilco bretheren soaked up every ounce of fun in the room.
Wilco’s sound these days is a bit like Bob Dylan and Radiohead thrown in a blender and pureed. The lyrics — still as poignant and moving as ever — are now cocooned in building electronics and whirling riffs that flow from the all-shapes-and-sizes guitars of Nels Cline. Where Tweedy’s raspy voice and “angry-musician” personality once dominated, Cline’s assault on his instrument and frenetic body language have moved closer to center stage for an increasing share the spotlight. Pulsating and gyrating with each chord, Cline shakes and twitches and produces a spectrum of sound that spirals every which way before coming to a screeching halt in time to let Tweedy’s voice be heard loud and clear.
Tweedy began the show with two slower songs: the new “Shake it Off” and the similar-sounding “Hell Is Chrome” from A Ghost is Born. Unlike most bands that like to start things off rocking and/or rolling, Tweedy is known for beginning shows with slower, more brooding selections that give the show a more intimate feel. It wasn’t until the third tune, “Handshake Drugs,” that the energy between the crowd and band synched up with each other…
If the goal of a band on any given night in any given city is to both put on a kickass show for its veteran fans and leave the first-time newbs with an impression that the music’s worth delving into further, then RAQ‘s got our permission to hang a “Mission Accomplished” banner following Friday’s extravanganza.
Vermont’s second most famous quartet played a bona fide house party at Brooklyn’s Club Exit this weekend. The evening’s promoters (Slanted View Productions) swept out the typical Eastern European clientele and transformed the venue into a double entendre-laced “On The L” party, a psychedlic playland deep inside the heart of the eerily quiet Polish neighborhood of Greenpoint.
We walked in just before 9 pm, and it instantly became clear this was not going to be a typical rock show. From the hundreds of bulging pupils (is everyone here that runaway bride chick from Atlanta?) to the enormous Borat-speaking bouncers to the obnoxiously loud house music blasting through PA system, we sure weren’t at The Wetlands anymore. Shit, the silly hot bartenders alone made the show better than any jamband concert in recent memory…
We’d like to thank you all for entering the Johnny Cash: At San Quentin contest, and we really wish to give you all free DVDs. But we can’t, and now
Like most music fans, we love to indulge our inner geek. HT reporter Kristian Telschow takes you to the frontlines for a better look at how to feed that beast…
It’s a quarter before midnight on an early November Monday as I pull into the 24-hour Wal-Mart in Amherst, New Hampshire. I’m strolling through the aisles toward the electronics department, and I begin to notice a scary sight: the late night Wal-Mart shoppers are out in full force.
I spy a horde of stoned college kids chuckling at some corny T-shirts, a couple who looked like zombies doing some late-night grocery shopping and a strange Indian fellow staring at a can of Pam cooking spray for a solid five minutes. It was a wild scene in the House That Sam Built.
So why, you might ask, am I hanging at the local Wal-Mart shortly before midnight on a Monday amongst the Wal-Mart dregs, instead of on my couch watching the Seahawks beat up on the Raiders? Because Guitar Hero II goes on sale at midnight, and the Veruca Salt inside me says I have to own it now.
For the uninitiated, the original Guitar Hero’s the critically acclaimed PlayStation 2 game — nay, experience — where players can jam out a variety of tunes spanning classic rock anthems to modern-day metal thrashers. As it turns out, with an updated songbook and more fan-friendly features, Guitar Hero II’s a great improvement on what was already the genuine article, and it’s everything I wanted it to be and more. It’ll challenge everyone from the jaded GH vets to the custie n00bz that are just discovering the game now. Allow me to explain…
One of the more eclectic collection of musicians since the early days of Lollapalooza gathered last night inside Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall to pay tribute to a living legend: the lucious Bobby Dylan.
Friend of HT Jeremy Welsh was on hand to report from the frontlines, and he’s done a great job of cobbling together a setlist from this once-in-a-lifetime event. And, yes, that’s actually Sandra “World’s Craziest Lesbian” Bernhard who played Like A Rolling Stone last night — now that’s a one-timer!
We at the Hidden Track home office rejoiced when we saw that Phil Lesh fulfilled his contractual and emotional obligation and played the gig. We can only hope his appearance means he’s well on the path to recovery.
Hopefully a recording surfaces soon, and when it does you can be sure we’ll post it here. I can’t even imagine how some of these songs sound. So without any more set-up, here’s a couple of words from Jeremy before we head into the specifics:
“Pretty amazing show last night at Avery Fisher Hall. The highlight of the night was most definitely The Roots’ cover of Masters of War (the first few verses were sung to the melody of the Star Spangled Banner). That was followed by Isis > Lovesick > Isis by Ryan Adams. Almost every other performance was top notch, except for Cat Power’s flake-out (House of the Rising Sun? wtf?) and the anti-climactic Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door, despite the effort that Patti put in.”
Here’s an official review from the good people at Billboard. But read on for the setlist, more eyewitness commentary, a Ryan Adams video and a first-hand account of the event from The Roots’ ?uestlove…
