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Very enthusiastic crowd at the House of Blues.
It was Dylan LeBlanc’s 21st birthday, and the audience sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to him. Someone in the audience handed him a big shot, and he drank it down, and then had to recover for a moment. 😉
Set list –1) I Just Wanted to See You So Bad
2) Happy Woman Blues
3) Tears of Joy
4) Pineola
5) I Lost It
6) Buttercup
7) Concrete & Barbed Wire
8 Copenhagen
9) Born To Be Loved
10) Fruits of My Labor
11) Convince Me
12) Come On
13) Seeing Black
14) Out of Touch
15) Awakening (tour debut?)
16) Righteously
17) Real Live Bleeding Fingers & Broken Guitar Strings
18) Changed The Locks
19) Honey BeeEncore:
20) Blessed
21) Joy
22) Hot Blood
23) Get Right With GodWith 7 songs from Blessed, I think this show had the most new songs to date. I had told Stoger pre-show that I soooo hoped to hear Copenhagen, Seeing Black, Blessed, and Convince Me, and I got my wish. 🙂 The set list was rollicking, and perfect for the venue and audience. Lu rocked the house!
I LIKE this set list. My favorite song from Blessed, “Copenhagen”. And one of all-time favorites, “Hot Blood”, in the encore! OMG!!! 😯 8) 😀
So, tell me something. For a time, Lu didn’t like singing “Hot Blood” because her “older” voice had a problem with the rising high notes (IIRC, she had someone – Gia Ciambotti? – fill in for her on the high notes on this song on the El Rey CD for SOW). Now that she is singing as well as she ever has (not just my humble opinion, but I have heard many others make this comment as of late), how’d she do? Did she hit the notes? Boy, if so, I sure hope someone recorded this one… 😉
Tom
Super setlists the last two nights… As Don Walser used to say, “there’s some real ‘stickers’ in there!” Best that LWs ever been singing? Hmmm… That’s some dangerous language. Although I have enjoyed hearing Lucinda’s voice evolve, I, for one lean towards her earlier, leaner less-gravel/Janis Joplin sound. Here’s a terrific example complete with Gurf Morlix playing his vintage Budweiser Rickenbacker slide-guitar (and buyin’ tomatoes for a casserole…). Just a cold chill, just-a-lump in my throat, just hot blood. Boy-howdy, do I remember watching the patented back-and-forth LWs hip-sway and head-bob back in the day (and sweet acoustic simple play). What a great work-up; just LWs and Gurf. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wrVY3ynMlI8
Was in the house at the HOB last night. Lu was in fine form-her voice was strong throughout, the vocals were well mixed, she seemed to be in a good mood all night, and a great set list. I’ve seen her many times over the years since Car Wheels, don’t think this is my favorite band configuration. All the players were good, and the guitar work was excellent, but felt like she could use another player on stage-whether another guitarist, a B3/keyboard player, or something. Good chunks of the show Lu wasn’t even holding a guitar, leaving this as a trio, and when she did have a guitar she only had that beautiful steel Tele on for a few songs. She’s obviously going for a very spare, stripped down sound with lots of space between the music. I spent about the first hour feeling the need for some more oomph in the music, until my ears (and gut) adjusted to the more “quiet” sound. I’ll be seeing her 2x in New Orleans in May, still looking forward to those shows.
I thought it was a really good show. Driving there I warned my GF there might be a lot of new material- which usually takes a while to like. But the first 5 songs were older stuff, I love ‘Just wanted to see you so bad ‘ as an opener, and it just got better.
If I could’ve sent a request in before the show it would have been for Hot Blood- never seen it live and it really made the show.
As for the band, they were good, Val did an interesting Righteously?? with an off beat that worked well.
after Hot Blood we were wondering what would be played next- but it seemed there weren’t many ‘favorite’ songs that we didn’t hear. The set list worked really well!Anyway we both had a great time- Thanks for a great show!
I agree with gmfeld that at times it seemed like they could have used an extra player onstage. Perhaps a ‘utility guy’ to add some pedal steel, or occassional keyboards. etc. That said – Val McCallum (only with them until end of April it seems) is an outstanding talent, and really knocked the crowd out. I was particularly impressed with his Johnny Cash like runs on Happy Woman Blues. Just great.
For those of you on FB, check my page – David Emerson – for a good 2 minute video clip from Boston HOB of Honey Bee.Yes, “Come On” and “Hot Blood” were tour debuts too, along with “Awakening,” I’m pretty sure. Lu herself is critical of her ability to hit certain notes during “Hot Blood” (including some body language self-doubt last night), but I loved the rendition myself. No Gia C needed (though it’d be great to see the two of them harmonizing on “Learning How to Live” sometime).
Tight tight show in Boston, great audience. Any tentativeness about “Copenhagen” and “Seeing Black” which lingered from past shows was dissipated last night. Several shouted requests (“Are You Alright” from multiple quarters) were not heeded, but I believe we got at least one song from every studio record save Ramblin’. West Words is correct that 7 from Blessed may be the high water mark in one show.
No Eilen Jewell in evidence night two, but perhaps she’ll be in house with Lu times over later in the touring year. And kudos to now-of-age bard Dylan Leblanc, who brought a Bostonian named Marissa on stage for two songs, one a cover of the Don Gibson classic “Oh Lonesome Me” which almost rivaled the time M Ward did it on stage with Lucinda (maybe that was Portland?). Fine night.
Thanks, stoger.
So, if it’s Thursday, you must be in NYC. 😉 I heard this morning on FB from bigsubi that it is raining quite a bit there today…
Tom
Thanks for all the glowing reports and setlists! Helps keep us homebound warriors in the loop.
I was listening to “Hot Blood” last night—true story—thinking I would love to hear this live. I never knew about the older Lu fretting about the younger Lu’s range. Interesting. Mellencamp says the same thing. “The young JM wasn’t worried about what the old JM had to sing.” 😆
@Lafayette wrote:
I was listening to “Hot Blood” last night—true story—thinking I would love to hear this live. I never knew about the older Lu fretting about the younger Lu’s range. :
Mebbe the high notes were not hit- but I’ve never heard anyone sing ‘tire…iron’ and make it sound really sultry. Every time I hear that it brings a smile to my face.
http://www.boston.com/ae/music/blog/2011/03/lucinda_fine_an.html
LUCINDA WILLIAMS
With Dylan LeBlanc
At: House of Blues, last nightBy James Reed
Globe StaffLucinda Williams got married in 2009, and even she wondered aloud in interviews how wedded bliss would affect her creativity. Anyone who feared happiness would spoil a woman who’s often at her best when life’s at its worst probably exhaled in relief early into Williams’s show at the House of Blues last night.
“Tryin’ hard to be a happy woman/ But sometimes life just overcomes me,” she sang on the chugging “Happy Woman Blues,” from the 1980 album of the same name.
She followed it up with the more optimistic barroom blues of “Tears of Joy”: “Now I have a real man/ Don’t have to pretend/ And that’s why I’m crying tears of joy.”
It was official: Williams still knows her way around a broken heart, but she has also made peace with hope and contentment.
Even when the songs were down and out, she sounded sublime at the House of Blues, assured and at ease. No doubt the club setting cut Williams some slack to loosen up, which was often at odds with her frequent glances at lyrics on a nearby music stand. Williams surveyed a wide swath of her career, from the earlier days (“I Lost It,” “Changed the Locks,” “Pineola”) to more recent fare (“Righteously,” “Honey Bee,” and most of her brand-new album, “Blessed”).
Williams is on the road with one of her leanest backing ensembles in recent memory, just David Sutton on bass, Butch Norton on drums, and Val McCallum on electric guitar and harmonica. Together with Williams on guitar, they fleshed out the songs with grace and economy, built firmly around Williams’s vocals. On several songs, it initially seemed like there was no fire, until you realized it was simply smoldering.
Much like the production on “Blessed,” the mood was mostly low-key except for when McCallum unleashed blistering solos that occasionally hijacked the songs. Other times, Williams put down her guitar long enough to become a dusky torch singer, never so evocatively as on “Born to be Loved,” a new song that was bookended with “Fruits of My Labor.”
By nature, Williams is not a raucous performer, but she doesn’t have to be. The hell-raising lives in the jagged edges and murky shades of her voice, not to mention her lyrics. “You can’t light my fire, so [expletive] off/ You didn’t even make me/ Come on!” is surely the most bracing kiss-off ever to be aimed at a lousy lover.
Celebrating his 21st birthday, Louisiana native Dylan LeBlanc opened the show with an unvarnished set of acoustic country-blues indebted to what he later requested from the audience: shots of Jack Daniel’s.
James Reed can be reached at jreed@globe.com.
By Jay N. Miller
For The Patriot Ledger
Posted Mar 10, 2011 @ 10:03 AMBOSTON —
Lucinda Williams still loves playing music, jugglingnew set lists every night, and she and her band still create one of the most singular sounds in all of rock ‘n’ roll, a heady blend of country, r&b, mysterious Southern Gothic, and reverb-drenched swamp rock/noir.
Wednesday night’s two-hour, 23-song journey through her fertile songbook was as much a treat as ever, as her 2008 marriage has truly seemed to reinvigorate the Lake Charles,Louisiana native.
Looking like a long-lostRolling Stones’sister, Williams was dressed in black jeans, a black vest with shimmery designs, a denim-colored shirt, and blue-tinted shades, her blonde hair artfully unkempt. As usual she kept consulting a music stand between songs, and sometimes during songs, but with the number of songs she’s written, and the complex lyrics she writes,not to mention the way she crafts new setlists almost every night, that was okay with her fans.
Williams latest album, “Blessed,” is her tenth studio album, and it’s a lively collection where her more recent happiness vibe permeates the music. We’re all familiar with some of the lost-love/life’s travailsepics Williams has composed, and some of them are absolutely brilliant, but that sliver of optimism always peaking around evenher more downbeat stuff has fully blossomed in recent years.
The new album, and this tour, also features a new band. Superb guitarist and longtime Williams foil Doug Petitbon is gone on to other projects, but his replacement, young Val McCallum is a worthy successor. No doubt the secret weapon in many of Williams’ most haunting, noir-ish songs is the finely nuanced work of her guitarist. David Sutton on bass and Butch Norton on drums make up a stellar rhythm section that crafts the subtly burning foundation of so many of her tunes. Wednesday night’s concert proved the new quartet is a monster, and the sound they created belied the fact there were only four musicians.
Wednesday’s set included seven of the 12 songs on “Blessed,” and Williams repeatedlythanked the audience for listening, and showing its appreciation for, the new music. The rest of the material was drawn from all stages of her lengthy career, and if some fans may havemisseda fewof her classics – no “Passionate Kisses,” or “Six Blocks Away”–there were plenty of gems not often heard at Williams shows.
Williams, 58, kicked it off with her easy drawl driving the country rocker “Just Wanted to SeeYou So Bad,” and then donned an acoustic guitar for “Happy Woman Blues,” which she turned into a honky tonk two-step. The slow-cooking “Tears of Joy” was a paean to lasting love, a moving country-blues that ended up being one of her most soulful numbers. Williams kept that acoustic guitar for “Pineola,” one of her more Southern Gothic story-songs, and her gospel-inflected vocal addedvolumes of meaning to the lyrics. “Buttercup” is a new song that fuses that trademark swamp-rock sound with some of Williams’ most upbeat lyrics, and it was a joyous nod to enduring love Wednesday.
One of the tunes from the new album, “Copenhagen,” seems to be about a friend’s demise, and it’s one of the more haunting numbers, an eerie ballad with a softly thumping rhythm, as Williams’ vocal achieved some otherworldly levels of spiritual pain. After that poignant moment, the chunka-chunk blues momentum of “Born to be Loved” was just the brightening agent we needed. And then an indelible version of her old “Fruits of My Labor,” which features some of her best poetic lyrics, brought more of that slow-burning fire.
“Convince Me” from the new CD was a gritty swamp-rock ballad which built to a fiery finish, as her plaintive lyrics nevertheless conveyed that Williams is an independent woman. The older favorite “Come On” came across in all its swampy glory, each line setting up the punch line chorus, and much of the crowd singing along. Another tune from the new album, “Seeing Black” was buoyant country-rock with an edgy kick.
“Out of Touch” is a more classic Williams song, all about feeling isolated in the midst of a relationship, a low key rumination enlivened by McCallum’s subtle guitar sizzle. “Awakening,” apparently beingdone for the first timelast night,rode a shimmering guitar figure, but it was one spot where Williams was just too laidback, and the song needed more energy. That brief problem was cured with a potboiling take on “Righteously,” as again the throng of about 1800 fans sang along heartily. The Rolling Stones-y rocker “Real Live Bleeding Fingers and Broken Guitar Strings” was every bitthe rollicking romp it usually is at these shows.
The older Williams chestnut “I Changed the Locks” was another trip to the grittiest side of honkly tonk music, and the regular set finale “Honeybee” was seriously pounding blues-rock. The highlights of Williams’ four-song encore were a marvelously nuanced solo rendition of “Blessed,” and a funky, down-home ride through “Joy.” The night ended with the haunting “Get Right With God,” Williams’ gospel-infused swoops providing one more stunning moment.
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