Built to Spill - Sacto/SF
acutejam
Posts: 1,433
Whoa... Built to Spill! I'll always remember my first time -- Outside Lands Festival over a massive festival PA. That can get you hooked bad! Past 3 nights surpassed. Friday night Harlow's in Sacramento and Saturday/Sunday at Slim's in SF. Awesome rock in very small clubs, nothing compares. So freakin' fantastic.
Harlow's is really tiny, third the size of Slim's? 300 folks? My gawd, Slim's is only 800 (pretty sure they exceeded that on Saturday, f'n sardines). Great sets, over the three nights it's easier to say what they DIDN'T play (Traces, Car, Time Trap, Broken Chair) than what they did, pulled out some pretty rare tunes deep in the catalog, and some awesome covers!
So fun, the covers, guess they just did a two night stint at a festival up north and did their hits on Friday and all covers on Saturday, so they were primed. The killer: Metallica's Orion! Roth took the shredding lead! BOC's Don't Fear the Reaper, New Order, The Smiths, Captain Beefheart, Neil, THE CLASH (Train in Vain). Kick ass!
Saturday had a quick mosh pit, ran 'til 1:30 am, incredible energy and crowd totally pumped. Sunday was a bit more sedate, but a better set, maybe. Tough to say, still sortin' it out in my head.
And yet ... they are breaking in new bass player and drummer, and it was noticable. Having seen them every tour since OLF, yeah, a bit of the tightness is missing - Nelson and Plouf just had years of working together and with the band. Plouf was very understated on the drums, but just the closest you can get to a human metronome. Just solid. Same for Nelson. Ah wells, we still have BTS!
At one song's cresendo, the new bass player just came crashing down to a totally wrong note that made Doug and Brett (now there's no confusion) glance over, then he did it again ... and again, three times in a row. Just didn't know what to play. Doug and Brett just laughed. Some of the songs punctuated with bass and drum hits were a bit sloppy...
Doug of course sporting a Warriors shirt for SF.
Harlow's they ended with New Order and wrapped it up tight. Not so at Slim's, both nights, epic jams 20-30 mins long -- Saturday, Neil's Cowgirl in the Sand! Opening acts grabbed some amps and guitars and jumped up on the merch tables around the venue and gave us that surround sound effect, hilarious! Like 10 guitar solos over the course of 20 minutes!
And then Sunday, pure mayhem! Closing with The Smith's How Soon Is Now? Again with various appearances atop the merch tables, but I swear they started the song at like 11:55 and ended at 12:30. By the end, the drummer was standing drinking a beer next to me in the crowd, Doug had walked off the stage, gave me a high five, shook hands and hugged folks, and then jumped up on a merch table, the photographer was playing the cowbell, some dude from the audience had jumped up on stage and took over the bass, Netson handed off his guitar and took over on drums (the 3rd drummer by that point), he was the only remaining actual BTS musician at that point.
At the end, Doug jumped back up on stage and had dudes from the opening acts and audience all around him like it was his new band and they all took a bow! F'n epic!
Stones just did a small club appearance, man, how fun it'd be to see PJ in a small club....
So check BTS out instead! They finish their West Coast tour in May and then hit Europe in September!
http://www.builttospill.com/tour
Harlow's is really tiny, third the size of Slim's? 300 folks? My gawd, Slim's is only 800 (pretty sure they exceeded that on Saturday, f'n sardines). Great sets, over the three nights it's easier to say what they DIDN'T play (Traces, Car, Time Trap, Broken Chair) than what they did, pulled out some pretty rare tunes deep in the catalog, and some awesome covers!
So fun, the covers, guess they just did a two night stint at a festival up north and did their hits on Friday and all covers on Saturday, so they were primed. The killer: Metallica's Orion! Roth took the shredding lead! BOC's Don't Fear the Reaper, New Order, The Smiths, Captain Beefheart, Neil, THE CLASH (Train in Vain). Kick ass!
Saturday had a quick mosh pit, ran 'til 1:30 am, incredible energy and crowd totally pumped. Sunday was a bit more sedate, but a better set, maybe. Tough to say, still sortin' it out in my head.
And yet ... they are breaking in new bass player and drummer, and it was noticable. Having seen them every tour since OLF, yeah, a bit of the tightness is missing - Nelson and Plouf just had years of working together and with the band. Plouf was very understated on the drums, but just the closest you can get to a human metronome. Just solid. Same for Nelson. Ah wells, we still have BTS!
At one song's cresendo, the new bass player just came crashing down to a totally wrong note that made Doug and Brett (now there's no confusion) glance over, then he did it again ... and again, three times in a row. Just didn't know what to play. Doug and Brett just laughed. Some of the songs punctuated with bass and drum hits were a bit sloppy...
Doug of course sporting a Warriors shirt for SF.
Harlow's they ended with New Order and wrapped it up tight. Not so at Slim's, both nights, epic jams 20-30 mins long -- Saturday, Neil's Cowgirl in the Sand! Opening acts grabbed some amps and guitars and jumped up on the merch tables around the venue and gave us that surround sound effect, hilarious! Like 10 guitar solos over the course of 20 minutes!
And then Sunday, pure mayhem! Closing with The Smith's How Soon Is Now? Again with various appearances atop the merch tables, but I swear they started the song at like 11:55 and ended at 12:30. By the end, the drummer was standing drinking a beer next to me in the crowd, Doug had walked off the stage, gave me a high five, shook hands and hugged folks, and then jumped up on a merch table, the photographer was playing the cowbell, some dude from the audience had jumped up on stage and took over the bass, Netson handed off his guitar and took over on drums (the 3rd drummer by that point), he was the only remaining actual BTS musician at that point.
At the end, Doug jumped back up on stage and had dudes from the opening acts and audience all around him like it was his new band and they all took a bow! F'n epic!
Stones just did a small club appearance, man, how fun it'd be to see PJ in a small club....
So check BTS out instead! They finish their West Coast tour in May and then hit Europe in September!
http://www.builttospill.com/tour
[sic] happens
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http://activate.metroactive.com/2013/04 ... e-stritch/
What 20-year-old bands are like when it's really all about the music.