Night 2 down. I'm counting the minutes to night 3. Love the beginning of a tour, you never know what's next!
Love is a first is a great opener. Surprised at first to see this as an opener (I shouldn't have been), but loving this song live. I thought the 'rant' was a little forced in yesterday's show, but seemed much more natural & comfortable tonight. Poets second, and I'm thinking what's next?!... but I think Poets needs to be later in the setlist. Very little of a jam or anything this early.
Josephine. Awesome. Love this song, thought it was gone from the setlist. It disappeared too early in the IBE tour. Gord kinda screwed up the words to the first verse, but a quick recovery.
Depression... ABAC... Nashville! Awesome! Love Nashville... but the crowd was DEAD. The guys in front of us left during this song to go get beer. Maybe it was just where I was sitting. Morning moon didn't help - the crowd was obviously jonesing for some old stuff.... and Fully Completely brought them back. Gord was canoeing around the stage w/ his mic stand for a paddle.... Stepping across the monitors.
Courage & Springtime to close... Crowd loved Courage, but was pretty reserved for Springtime.
Acoustic... Thompson Girl... I'm not a huge fan of the song, but enjoyed the acoustic take on it. Very nice. My take - they're working very hard on the acoustic versions... putting the effort in to the versions to keep them faithful. Flamenco surprised... 2 nights in a row? really? I won't complain for such a beautiful song. I really expected something like Scared next, but totally surprised w/ M@W.... Fantastic! Gord could barely stay seated for the whole song.
Struggle was next... I took the opportunity to look around the crowd, was actually surprised at the number of people visibly singing along with the song. Nice to see.... and then finally... Queen of the Furrows! Great. I'm no musician here, so I'm going to get the instrument wrong, but Bobby's been playing a mandolin-type instrument for a couple of the songs on the new album.... he had that AND an electric guitar strapped on for this song, and went back & forth between the two. I'm really liking this song, despite how ridiculous I feel singing the lyric "hens cluck and roosters crow"...
In view.... heard it yesterday too, but noticed tonight how different it sounded having Bryson play along. Much closer to the album versions, vs. the live version we were getting on the last tour. El Dorado... fanstastic. The crowd was really starting to get into the show now, and a lot louder. Bobcaygeon is always a crowd pleaser... Then the Dark Canuck! Awesome! Gord sat on the speakers for a spell, much like the IVL tour. The latter half came off awesome. Dark & moody.
Family Band was great to see... love the song. The mix sounded a little too loud & washed out to me... but maybe I'm just getting old...

... And then Blow to close. Crowd went wild. No crazy antics or anything from Gord... just a solid performance to close.
I was updating my show list on the hip.com before the show... and commented to my wife about the songs that I had seen performed just once (she thinks I've been to too many shows)... Specifically mentioned Throwing Off Glass. Band comes out for the encore "We're going to play a song now that I think we've played just once before"... and I can't even think what it could be... heck, they've played the Bear twice now. They launch into throwing off glass. I little more electric & edgier than the album version... almost more moodier. Not as "delicate" as the album version, but thought it came off great. I love how this band cares about their songs.
And then 50MC to close. Crowd goes nuts. Fantastic. Bring on tomorrow. I can't wait.