- This topic has 12 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated 13 years ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Don’t know if road warrior stoger made it to this show, but here’s a great review.
“Can’t Let Go” led the set list again and more sound troubles. Lu didn’t make the sound check.http://www.roanoke.com/extra/wb/300285
Concert review: Lucinda Williams overcomes sound woes at Jefferson Center
By Tad Dickens
777-6474Stephanie Klein-Davis | The Roanoke Times
Singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams performed Tuesday night at Jefferson Center, leading the set with “Can’t Let Go,” “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road” and “People Talkin’.”
For a few minutes, it seemed that sound troubles were going to be the story of Lucinda Williams’ Tuesday night show at Jefferson Center in Roanoke.
“Hang on. I’m sorry,” Williams said after stopping “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road” just into the first verse. “What does it sound like out there?”
The crowd of 519 in the 900-capacity Shaftman Hall roared its approval as she continued: “Because up here it sounds like I’m in a cave. … Unfortunately, I didn’t make sound check. That’s my fault. I just want to make sure it sounds good out there.”
“Turn up, Lucinda!” someone yelled, though it was apparently more of a reverb than a volume problem that irked Williams. Later, “Greenville” was barely rolling before she stopped again, telling the crowd, “I don’t want to cheat you.”
Eventually, the situation was settled. Williams and her band worked back into the groove, delivering some of America’s best roots, rock and folk music for more than 90 minutes.
Williams had written nearly all of it, only taking a break from her own music to sing Bob Dylan’s “Tryin’ To Get To Heaven.” She even brought out a new, unrecorded song, “Stowaway In Your Heart,” about a lover who has given her some peace.
But the rest of the set was about her deep catalog. It ranged from some of her earliest material (“Changed the Locks”) to songs from Grammy-winning “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road” (“Joy” and “2 Kool 2 Be 4-Gotten”) up through her latest album, “Blessed” (“Copenhagen,” “Born To Be Loved”).
There were a lot of words to remember in at least 18 songs (this reviewer had to leave in order to make deadline as Williams began singing “Lake Charles”). Williams had to use a music stand loaded with lyric sheets. Her drawled-out instrument dripped syllables and controlled little catches and tears, like one of her heroes, Tammy Wynette.
Her band, Buick 6 — which had opened the show with a short set of instrumentals that included the spooky “Sleepwalk” and the surf classic “Wipeout” — was a force.
Guitarist Blake Mills, in his mid-20s, showed that he is a budding master. Drummer Butch Norton drove home big beats when he wasn’t using a variety of percussion instruments to texturalize. And bassist David Sutton played liquid lines on electric and upright instruments.
They rolled with her through the end of a set that climaxed with “Joy” and a raging “Honey Bee.”lwj
The encore:
Blessed
A song from Car Wheels (I’ll think of it later)
It’s Not My Cross To Bear by the Allman Brothers
Get Right With GodDid I leave anything out?
I might have the order wrong. “Get Right With God” was definitely last.
Does anyone know the first song Buick 6 performed? It reminded me of a Ry Cooder song but I can’t think of the name of it. I’m not saying it is a Ry Cooder song. I don’t know
@DavidW wrote:
The encore:
Blessed
A song from Car Wheels (I’ll think of it later) YES, PLEASE DO: IT’S UNUSUAL FOR A SONG FROM CW TO BE SQUEEZED INTO ENCORE LIKE THIS. THANKS FOR POSTING.
It’s Not My Cross To Bear by the Allman Brothers
Get Right With GodDid I leave anything out?
I might have the order wrong. “Get Right With God” was definitely last.
Does anyone know the first song Buick 6 performed? It reminded me of a Ry Cooder song but I can’t think of the name of it. I’m not saying it is a Ry Cooder song. I don’t know
“Lake Charles” is the song from Car Wheels that I think was part of the encore. Can anyone else confirm that it was part of the encore? I don’t want to post wrong information. She definitely did it, and it was towards the end. The writer of the review above says he had to leave while Lu was performing it so that reinforces that it was towards the end. I think she did two encores. “Honey Bee” might have been the first. I’m usually good at remembering the songs performed, but I do get them out of order. Off the top of my head, she also did “Righteously”, “Essence”, and the songs I mentioned in my first post in addition to the ones mentioned in the review. I’m in a hurry now and will post again if I think of more. Maybe someone else can verify, correct, or add to my posts.
Thanks for brain-checking, David. That sounds likely–though it has been a solo song this tour, making it unlikely the band would walk on during the first verses of “Blessed,” finish it, then walk back off. But don’t stress out over it. Maybe “L C” was late in the main set.” At any rate, you saw a good one.
It was a great show, Stoger. I regret attempting to recreate the encore now. I should have just added the songs I remember to the songs mentioned in the review. It is possible that today when I visualize last night I see the band members walk away for Lu to do “Lake Charles” alone on acoustic. That might have tricked my mind into remembering it as part of the encore – if that makes sense. I don’t take notes but am familiar with all of her songs (except the new unrecorded ones, of course).
The drums might have been a little jarring at first, but I don’t have any complaints on the sound.
If Lu thinks she cheated the audience, she could always come back at the end of the tour and make it up to us. I wouldn’t mind.
DavidW, thanks for your report.
Let’s watch part of an nice instrumental from Buick 6 @Jefferson Centre.
http://www.youtube.com/user/btstephe#p/a/u/2/PcYkWhGkcS8lwj
Thanks for the links to the youtube videos, LWjetta.
I’ve already watched and saved Buttercup. I’m getting ready to leave and will get the other tomorrow.Here is the set list copied from Lu’s facebook.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/LucindaWilliams
This looks accurate. Thank you, Lewis.
Cant Let Go
Car wheels on a Gravel Road
People Talkin’
2-Cool 2 Be 4-Gotten
Stowaway in Your Heart (unrecorded)
… Greenville
Over Time (Willie Nelson)
Copenhagen
Blue
Born to be Loved
Tryin’ to get to Heaven (Bob Dylan)
I Lost It
Buttercup
Essence
Righteously
Changed the Locks
Joy
Honeybee
Blessed
Lake Charles
It’s Not My Cross To Bear (Allman Bros.)
Get Right with GodThanks, DavidW – this has now been posted at setlist.fm…
Tom
A followup from Tad Dickens regarding the Roanoke show.
http://www.roanoke.com/extra/wb/300732
First off, let’s truck in a little rumor control: Despite some scuttlebutt that’s floated around Roanoke, Lucinda Williams did not cancel a bunch of her shows after her Oct. 25 performance at Jefferson Center.
Setlists, Facebook comments from fans, even a review in the Allentown, Pa., Morning Call’s music blog seem to prove it. Responding to an email, Williams’ husband and manager, Tom Overby, said that as far as he knows, she has not canceled a concert since Sept. 11, 2001.
Maybe that rumor sprang from some small collective desire to explain what was up with Williams, who twice stopped her Jefferson Center show because of issues she was having with the sound. Of course, that was her own fault, she admitted with apologies, telling the audience she had missed sound check.
Overby wrote in the email exchange: “She only goes into some sound checks once we get going — when you’re playing two hours a night 5-6 nights a week, we just try to be careful with her voice. We also had just finished a stretch of four in a row, which we very rarely ever do.”
Performers miss sound checks. It happens. And that sometimes leads to sound troubles — which leads to another sort of rumor, for lack of a better word.
In this case, the rumor was that it was Jefferson Center’s fault that the sound was off. This was apparently based on my Oct. 26 review of the show, which is online at roanoke.com/wb/300285.
Nowhere in that review did I write that Jefferson Center was responsible for the sound. Maybe I could have been more specific about who exactly was running sound, but with 14 column inches to work in, there was no room for that sort of breakdown.
So, Susan Gibson of Stage Sound fielded “lots of calls” about the issue. Stage Sound supplies the P.A. system for Jefferson Center shows, including Williams’ concert. And Stage Sound’s Gibson runs sound for many of the shows there – including a beautifully mixed Lionel Loueke Trio jazz show on Oct. 15 at the Jeff’s rehearsal hall.
But she wasn’t at the Williams show. And though Stage Sound provided the main speakers and P.A. amps, Williams’ crew provided mics, monitors, consoles and sound engineer, Gibson wrote in an email the day my review ran.
Sorry your phone blew up that day, Susan.
Booms and clams
Williams complained during the set that the sound was too “boomy.” Moments like those can be really interesting. How will the crowd respond? How will the band respond?
The audience members who yelled at those points were on Williams’ side. Interestingly enough, most of the band wound up with a temporary case of the “clams.” (In musical parlance, a clam is a little mistake.)
Williams and her band were playing her song “Greenville” the second time she stopped to deal with sound. Once they got back into it, they were clearly off their game.
The otherwise monstrous guitarist Blake Mills blew easy country-style double-stop licks. Drummer Butch Norton, a groove king with lots of taste, blew his tambourine groove for a second. And Williams sang flat for most of the song.
From there, the sound remained stable, and the band re-established its subtle-to-shocking style.
When young Mills wasn’t spinning guitar lines that often went beyond my ability to describe, he provided great texture to fill spaces left open in the trio format. Norton grooved deeply in the pocket, and bassist David Sutton, who never seemed fazed by the stoppages, continued doing his thing.
Williams’ singing continued to strengthen as the set rolled on, though she did have trouble with the near-staccato phrasing of “Righteously.”
Really, the whole night just made the performers come off as more human than one typically gets at a big show.
As one who often feels a bit too human, I appreciate that.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.