That was one heck of a setlist that Alejandro Escovedo drew up last night, but it took me a few songs to connect: I had some distractions!
Things might have kicked off with "John Conquest" and "Sacramento and Polk," the opening songs off his newest album, Echo Dancing. They are on the written list, but they didn't follow that list exactly, and I do not know either song well yet, so maybe that's wrong? Songs that I know for sure got played, exactly as written, included a swampy, evil-sounding "Bury Me;" "Everybody Loves Me;" and a rocking "Break This Time." I think "Luna de Miel" (not a song I know, but on the written list) came next, as written, then a driving take off The Crossing's "Teenage Luggage" (which built to such a fearsomely powerful peak as we got to the centerpiece lyric, "America is a bloodstain in a honky tonk kill," that some members of the audience just erupted with pogoing and cheers, which they kept up to the end of the song).
Things quieted down a bit after that with "Sensitive Boys," which Escovedo had dedicated at the folk fest a few years ago to Chip and Tony Kinman, but this time dedicated to an absent John Armstrong, who I sort of had hoped would be in town for the Bergmann gig and the Braineater show, as well, but nope! We miss you, John...
That song was followed by a mid-tempo "Dear Head on the Wall," which Escovedo helpfully explained was written about the juncture between taxidermy and Buddhism, assuring us that if we thought about it, it would make sense! I guess I haven't thought about it enough yet.
As things were up to that point, I was buzzing with the excitement of having played a small hand (in the form of my Straight piece) in promoting a gig that was reasonably well-attended, and that many friends and gig acquaintances were enjoying (including Ford Pier, Lynn Werner, Gerald Yoshida, Erik Iversen, Bev Davies, Talesha Zimmerman, and others). Plus it was a gig that I actually got David M. to come out to -- which is an even bigger coup than getting him to kinda admit that it was misleading to compare the Bongos to T. Rex, even if they covered T. Rex (which I also did, earlier this week; has marriage softened him?). I was worried M. would just split after Mastro, so for the first few songs of Escovedo's set, I was trying to see if he was still around, and also trying to take care of bathroom visits, hydration, and creature comforts, so I wasn't really as focused as I might have been (unlike with James Mastro's opening set, where I was all ears and right up front; too few people caught that part of the night, sadly, which started pretty promptly at 8pm).
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Note that, even with a smaller audience, Mastro had been chatty and funny and at ease; M. and I both enjoyed his opening set immensely, and both bought his solo album, in our respective medias of choice (CD for M., vinyl for me). Mastro offered a free CD to anyone who could name the source of the chorus on one song, "One day my trouble is going to have trouble with me," which he only would say came from his favourite writer, Dr. Seuss. I wanted badly to guess Thidwick the Big Hearted Moose, but I don't think that's it; Thidwick is altogether too kind for such thoughts, even though that's one of Seuss's nastier stories (I bet it was Ayn Rand's favourite Dr. Seuss; it definitely comes up in Robert Nozick's libertarian treaties, Anarchy, State and Utopia); and the creatures that trouble Thidwick do have troubles of their own by the end. Apparently Mastro has played that song with Levon Helm doing background vocals, which is a real claim to fame and a name I would have dropped in the Straight article, if Ian Hunter, Patti Smith, and members of Television weren't enough (and if I'd been aware of it).
I also liked that Mastro explicitly connected "Right Words, Wrong Song" to the upcoming US election and said some nice things about how much saner Canadians were politically. But Mastro seemed pretty darn sane to me (incidentally, Escovedo got a laugh, by the way, in introducing him as coming from "Hoboken, Texas;" everyone else in the band was from Texas...). He also explained that not all audiences dug "My God," which is where the Canadian vs. American thing first surfaced, as I recall...
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To come back to the Escovedo set, however, where things really clicked for me was just after the mid-point, with "Sally was a Cop," also not a song I know well, but a terrific one, it turns out. especially last night (dare we hope for a live album of this tour? They apparently recorded a KEXP session this morning). What they played seemed quite a bit longer and richer than what's on the studio album -- see here for an example -- and less overwhelmed by the CD's mechanical-feeling drumbeat. It was the first song where I really hooked into the guitar interplay between Escovedo and Mastro, where I got deeply sucked into attending to how carefully and intelligently they listened to each other, looked to each other, responded to each other, and generally complemented each other, taking turns trading off leads and supporting the other on rhythm. It brought me back to one of my other "favourite guitar moments," watching Lou Reed and Mike Rathke respond to each other in similar ways on the Ecstasy tour in Tokyo. Neither man plays much like Lou Reed (Escovedo played more like Neil Young, really -- from the gut); but there was the same feeling of learning how a musician makes choices based on what other musicians are doing; you could hear how they were hearing each other, if that makes sense. I relished it and wished I'd recorded it.
In fact, I saw saving my battery and storage for the song I thought was coming next, "Chelsea Hotel 78," which I was really looking forward to. Maybe it's just that the song is so dark, so infused with pain, but Escovedo swapped it out for a much more upbeat "Always a Friend," which he was somewhat disparaging of in his intro, talking about songs that stick to you whether you like them or not, but that you play because other people seem to enjoy them; it was an eccentric way to introduce a song, but it got laughs! (And the song is an enjoyable one, if not entirely what I had been hoping for).
That was quickly followed by another high point of the gig, which I did record, but am waiting for Escovedo and Mastro's permission to make public: a mashup of "Casteñuelas" (off Escovedo's new album) with "Castanets," off A Man Under the Influence. Mastro had picked it as one of his favourite songs to do in the current setlist; it also features plenty of communication between the guitarists, so I hope they assent to my sharing it.
That ended the main concert; then there was an encore, featuring WTF podcaster Marc Maron, of "Beast of Burden" (which a Facebook friend of mine captured on their phone) and the "Canadian national anthem," Neil Young's "Like a Hurricane." This was great, and Maron took lead for the most part, using his guest spot to maximum effect.
That ended the night, but several people lingered, and there was a small, informal, shifting meet and greet by the stage door with Ford and Penny spending time behind a small token barrier (which even Gerald Yoshida, pen and album in hand, respected, autograph hound that he is). Doug Andrew, Erik Iversen and myself chatted a bit, all there in the audience. I had my own stack of records I hoped to get signed, but also had something up my sleeve: I had figured out the perfect thing to do with an extra copy of the True Believers album I had picked up, getting Alejandro to inscribe it to Bev. Thanks to James for helping facilitate that! Things went even better, when Escovedo came out to investigate who this Bev person was, and he perked up to see photos of himself with Rank and File back in 1980 -- I shared some on my phone, and he was very interested in seeing more (two of them are in this post). Sadly, the photos I snapped at the end of the night, with Gerald and James and Alejandro and Bev, are kind of blurry; maybe my lens got dirty? I share them no less.
It was a terrific night, all told, and I'm glad so many of Vancouver's "cool kids in their 50s and upwards" got to enjoy it. Next time, I swear, I'm going to try harder to actually talk to Alejandro before he comes to town.
Hey, anyone want to bring the Bongos to Vancouver? James says they would do it!
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