The songs:

1.  POETS:  As hoped, the first song.  Gord D. shakin' the shaker (let's call it a gourd).
2.  GRACE TOO:  The SNL lyric version ("I'm Tragically Hip")
3.  COURAGE
4.  ESCAPE IS AT HAND FOR THE TRAVELLIN' MAN
5.  SPRINGTIME IN VIENNA:  Gord D. still tosses bells up and catches them during this song
6.  YAWNING AND SNARLING
7.  SOMETHING'S ON
8.  GIFT SHOP:  Introduced as a song about heavenly delights right here on earth
9.  VAPOR TRAIL
10. FLAMENCO:  Introduced as 'this song is called sweet sunshine in February.  Gord D. sang a bit of "don't worry baby" at the end--perhaps in tribute to their departed friend
11. FIREWORKS
12. MEMBERSHIP:  Introduced as "it's a river song"
13. AHEAD BY A CENTURY:  Introduced as "this is a song about a tree"
14. BOBCAYGEON:  At the start Gord D. notes "I hope the Black flies don't carry me away"
15. NAUTICAL DISASTER:  Still a favorite, and they lived up to expectations again
16. SAVE THE PLANET
17. AT THE 100TH MERIDIAN:  As opposed to Hengalo, Gord notes 'Tokyo'. There was a brief jam in the middle like usual, lyrics included "you're like a milestone, didn't seem like nothin' at first"
--- FIRST ENCORE ---
18. DAREDEVIL
19. CHAGRIN FALLS:  Johnny's drum techs changed a cymbal at the end. Damaged perhaps?
20. NEW ORLEANS IS SINKIN':  Audience went nuts, as usual.  Was a brief jam in middle, but mot much if any lyrics
--- SECOND ENCORE ---
21. LET'S STAY ENGAGED:  Introduced as "instead of good bye, let's stay engaged"
22. BLOW AT HIGH DOUGH:  You know what happened to the audience. Incidentally (or maybe not) they closed the first show back in '96 with 'Blow'

Hope all is well... I've finally found sometime to write on how the weekend was seeing the hip over 4 days in Montreal, Quebec City (Power Reporter), and the Ottawa shows...

Montreal 02-05-99
Unfortunately I didn't manage to win Phantom Zone tickets... (though a few bastards or daddys that I told how to win got them)... I had 23rd row seats off to the left of the stage... they were pretty great seats, and the concert was unbelievable.. the crowd was really into it from the beginning to the end...  they played some classics like Lionized, On the Verge, and Luxury.... Escape is at Hand was really good as was 100th...which included Never-Ending/Lofty Pines... New Orleans was classic, with
This Flight Tonight and Insomniacs tied in there...  Gord seemed fairly lively moving around a little, and the band as a whole was great.... I didn't think it could get much better... maybe a few different songs but either way a GREAT show overall.. the recording of the show came out really nice, and will be treed fairly soon DO NOT ASK ME FOR IT BEFORE HAND unless it's for something really rare that could be treed or a NICE copy of a 99 show. at least another copy of it out there..

Quebec City 02-06-99
As some of you already know, I had won the Power Reporter contest for this one... I had to be there at about 3:30 in the afternoon.. le Colisee is a pretty small place, and it's sort of falling apart, the outside looks really nice but the inside is sort of a dump (I'm not trying to put anyone down or anything, but it's no wonder they lost the Nords, they needed a new arena and just couldn't afford it).. backstage was really small and old looking... I got to meet the band for a little bit, but I sort of expected to see them for a bit longer.. I guess since it was Gord D. bday it was hard to get a hold of anyone.. they seemed all really busy.. while I was being told what I had to do for the power reporter contest, I heard music coming from the room next to me.. I
thought it was just the radio, but as I listened more closely I could here them playing a bit of thugs and stuff like that.. it was the hip rehearsing! it was great... the rehearsed for about an hour or so, and then went out for the soundcheck... it last for about 45 minutes and they played 4 songs... Inevitability of Death, Greasy Jungle, Thompson Girl, and another one I forget (check the power reporter page for quebec if you really have to know)... after the soundcheck I had to write a small review and how everything was going.. nothing to spectacular, whatever came to mind went... when we finished we ate some great food that was catered.. nice great selection and really good.. the band ate there as well... pretty weird eating with them actually... by this time it was around 7:15, so I had to get ready with the digital camera so I went out in the phantom zone (if only everyones seats were this good, you could practically touch them)... the hip went back to rehearsing by this time, and I could hear a few new things which sounded really nice.. By Divine Right is great, though they didn't really change their setlist over the 4 shows which was sort of shitty, but either way they're pretty good to see, if you get the chance don't skip them out, atleast for the first time or so you see them.. afterwards it could get a little annoying to know what's coming next every time... in between BDR and the hip (8:05) we had to go in the back and check the pics of BDR out and choose which were going on the web.. at around 8:40 the hip came on, and the crowd just went nuts, there was probably only about 4000 people there.. the top level was totally empty, but of the 4 concerts they were definitely the wildest and loudest... they started singing the song they sing at european soccer games, the oooooooh waaaaaaaay oooooh way oh way ooooohh whatever... either way it was a riot... something i'll definitely never forget... after the concert I had to write my review, which by this time I really didn't feel like doing cause I was so tired from the past few days (unfortunately I had exams the week before all this so I had like zero hours of sleep all week)... after the review we got to meet the band a little more.. Gord D. was totally blasted out of his mind... he was pretty funny, like a little kid, someone asked him what was written on his shirt, and he said pointing at it Nordiclict (a bar in netherlands they play).. he started spelling it out, "Noooordiclict, nnoooooorthhherrrn star.. iiiitt meaaans norrrrrthern star, nnoooooordiclict, nordiclict" it's sort of hard to explain but it was REALLY funny.. Johnny was after the girls as usual, and everyone else sort of was just sitting around talking... unfortunately we couldn't stay too too long afterwards since we had to drive back to Montreal that night...when I was first introduced to Gord d., I was wearing my Croatian soccer jersey and he actually knew what it was and some of the players on the team.. evidentally Gord D. is a big Dutch soccer fan.. I was pretty impressed by that.. the set itself was REALLY nice... 100th meridian was TERRIFIC, they played Blond solid/Never-Ending/(I'll try)/Every Irrelevance.. truly amazing.. Grace and Poets went off really well as well.. the original setlist had IOD and Rules but they were cancelled out for 100th.. Little Bones ended it off nicely..Unfortunately I didn't get to really talk to the band as much as I had wished for.. it was basically a hi-bye type thing with maybe a few words exchanged... nothign too drastic, but either way they're super nice, they came up to me to say hi and stuff, and they gave me a poster with their signatures etc.... truly an AMAZING night... the travel back was
pretty shitty, I only got in at like 4:30am.. my girlfriend and I were dying on our way home the recording of the show was a little messed up at the beginning but after a few songs it sounds REALLY nice.. again, it'll be treed soonI will put all the pics from the digital camera up soon on my site, I was lucky enough to keep the shots I took..

Ottawa #1 02-07-99
I woke up at like 8:30 to play a hockey game (yes crazy) and afterwards my friend & I was picked up by Rob who already had Matt and another friend with him... this was at about 2pm... we got into ottawa, ate some, and then went to the show.. my seats were pretty shitty, 48th row floors (LAST ROW FLOORS)... the view was so so, and of the 4 concerts it was the worst, yet really good in itself. the setlist was very dull though, nothing spectacular, they played Flamenco which was nice, Yawning or Snarling & Let's Stay Engaged were the rare highlights or older songs, they also played Daredevil... it was a good night, but definitely a bit of a downer since I was in the front the night before, the recording is probably the best of the 4... really nice.. there was atleast 1 other good recording of the show..

Ottawa #2 02-08-99
I was picked up at around 5:00 by Rob once again (thanks for the driving Rob!) with Trevor and Dan.. we got there while BDR was playing... the seats WERE AWESOME.. 9th row centre.. really great seats... the concert may have been the best of the bunch.. they seemed to play EVERYTHING.. Cordelia, 50 MISSION CAP!, Rules, Emperor was nice (sorry sili it's a
great song especially live), 700 ft, Little Bones, Locked and a few others... it was really great.. Gord D. was going nuts the entire show walking all over the place and bobby baker was doing some great work... the crowd was a lot smaller than the night before.. the top level was curtained off so I'd say there was maybe about 4-5000 less people than the night before... it was also a lot older crowd, the crowd for the first show was REALLY young, I must have seen atleast 10 people under 10, and I didn't even really look around... this was a great show, and will make for a great tree.. the recording came out fairly nice, and will be a nice one to add to anyone's collection... there was atleast 2 people recording at the show, and both copies seemed pretty good..

hopefully I didn't forget anything
take care
Peter

When tickets went on sale for this tour, I was at the box office first thing in the morning after close to 18 hours of waiting. 18 hours for 120 odd minutes of music.

Ottawa II is announced. I buy tickets one row ahead of Ottawa I from Chris Bullee. He waited 16 hours less than me.

Ottawa I:

Coolest moment of the night: being behind a car with the license plate 'CMS LAW'. Cumslaw? C.M.S. Law? Huh? Crack My Spine Like A Whip! Damn, that's a cool plate.

Worst moment of the night: finding out it was over.

I met Cat beofore the concert for the first time, and Rohit or the 3rd or 4th time. Cat and her friend (shit, can't remember her name) were great people, and they even took the abuse of me commenting that I could be one of their sons.. I was pretty assholeish that night, come to think of it.

By Divine Right was really good. I actually yelled "Better than I thought!!!" after their first song.. a bit more assholeish, but I was pumped.

We've all seen the set list, but here it is again with my comments:

Poets: "Thanks... but do you know this one?"
Grace, Too: I wish they opened with this. My heart rate gets pumped as the drums get quicker.
Courage: I held my copy of 'Two Solitudes' high in the air for this one. I just happened to find it in my camera bag.
Escape: very true to the album.
Springtime: I think that Gord kicked a bit beachball into the crowd for this one.
Yawning or Snarling: I screamed so loud at this one, and yelled 'THANK YOU!!!'. I love this song, ant it rocks live. The angst isn't limited to the studio cut.
Something On: Not bad.. the band was tight but Gord was distracted.
Gift Shop: The lights were amazing.. I hope I got them on film.
Vapour Trails: a jump-up-and-down, scream-along song.
Flamenco: very mellow. The lighters came out for this one. Gord sang a bit of "Don't Worry Baby" at tne end. Significance?
Fireworks: the crowd was jumping up and down again.
Membership: "This is a river song"
ABAC: "This song is about a tree"
Bobcaygeon: Gord pretended to drive in this song. About the only action we got from Gord all night. More later.
Nautical Disaster: Great song, great live, great underwaterish lights, and Gord sang "C'mon, c'mon" a la Live Between Us.
Save the Planet: Least favourite of the night.
100th Meridian: The only time the band went into unexplored territory, and the only time Gord let loose. The sound was tight, but the band was not as lively as they could have been. I didn't notice how bland they were acting 'till the second show. "You're like a milestone: don't seem like nothin' at first." good jam. I was disappointed not to hear anything about the "Lofty Pines"

Encore 1:

Daredevil: Gord sang this one different at first, and I liked it better.
Chagrin Falls: I got so into this one, I sang my own Gord-esque rants in between the verses. "I triped, I fell. I triped and fell into you. You fell, you fell too. I dusted off, I'm Dustin Hoffman? I'm Dustin Hoffman to you." Okay, I'm not Gord Downie. The drum guys changed a symbal mid-song. That was neat to watch.
NOIS: Disappointing.. no real jam or rant. I yelled "I had a job before this", and the audience around me laughed and cheered. I didn't really want to hear Killerwhaletank, but I listen to it so often that I anticipate those lines whenever I hear New O.

Encore 2:

Let's Stay Engaged: A nice way to end the night. I was surprised, but happy.
BAHD: meh. I've always liked the live groove better than the studio, but I wish he ended with something more lively and less over-played.. perhaps Little Bones or something.

Comments:

The seats were good, and so were my seatmates. I was shooting away with my camera, and a bunch of people got my number for doubles. The guy infront was taping (just a walkman and a mic), and he was pretty enthusiastic. The security guards... they pissed me off. How can you be so impervious to music?

As for Gord and the band.. they were tight, but they fell flat.. The songs were so faithful to the studio cuts that.. I wasn't bored but I was a bit disappointed. I wanted something to remember.. something that will get triggered every time I heard a certain song. Instead, the live songs triggered memories I associated with the album versions of songs, and I ended up drifting back to other times instead of living in present ones.

I loved it.. it was an amazing experience.. but Gord was tired and he set the pace for the rest of the band. They were better than any other band, but they wern't as good as the Hip. being so famous as a live band works for and against you: you can't rest a bit for a night without assholes like me getting on their cases.

If it wern't for the second show I woulodn't be so hard on them. The second show was in a new league.. but I've spent half an hour on this, so I'll post number two in a moment. In closing:

I walked back to my friend Craig's house after the show. He lives a 20 minute walk away, and we beat a lot of the traffic out of there. The whole way home we were honked at, though. People stuck their heads out of the windows and waved. People rolled down their windows and let us hear the songs they were playing in the car. It was cool, the sense of community.

Oh, the final cool thing: in the middle of Something On, Gord yelled: "You with the camera, go over there." Being the guy he was pointing at, I went where he commanded and snapped a few shots of him posing for me. Then he said "You with the flag, go over there!" and pointed somewhere else.

                   Traditional zip missing from
                   Tragically Hip

                   Lynn Saxberg
                   The Ottawa Citizen

                   Talk about anti-climactic. After lining up for tickets two months ago and
                   listening to Tragically Hip CDs all weekend, I wasn't the only Hip fan
                   pumped to see the band. There were plenty of others preparing
                   themselves for a rocking good time, judging by the number of folks in the
                   lobby drinking beer through a straw before the show.

                   There were some 13,000 of us on Sunday, enough to sell out the Corel
                   Centre in the first of two nights in Kanata -- or Stittsville, as Hip singer
                   Gord Downie calls the suburban arena.

                   A sold-out show on a major Canadian tour, close to home for the
                   Kingston band, capping off a sunny winter weekend. All the ingredients
                   were there. But what should have been a great show turned out to be
                   just a good one. What went wrong?

                   The show's failure to excite didn't involve any technical problems.
                   Groovy lights, a sparkling chandelier and a minimal but vaguely exotic
                   stage set-up established a warm, inviting atmosphere.

                   The band was well-rehearsed, tight and focused, and chose its songs
                   wisely, except for a slight preference for less familiar tracks from the
                   latest disc, Phantom Power.

                   But even the proven hits, with a couple of exceptions, seemed flat. At
                   first it was as if the band was pacing itself. It stuck close to the studio
                   versions of songs such as Poets, Grace Too and Springtime in Vienna in
                   the first half, but then never really built up steam through the second
                   hour, churning out faithful but unadorned renditions of Fireworks, Ahead
                   By A Century, Nautical Disaster and Save The Planet, to name a few.

                   Singer Downie, whose trance-like performance is normally the focus of
                   the show, with his stream-of-consciousness ad-libbing and jerky
                   movements around the stage, appeared chained to his microphone
                   stand.

                   His restraint set the pace for the others. Except for drummer Johnny
                   Fay, who pounded the skins with awesome force, the others were like
                   robots.

                   Now no one's expecting Van Halen-style gymnastics or ZZ Top
                   choreography from the Hip, but the musicians could act a little livelier.
                   For a band made up of good friends who are supposedly in tune with
                   each other's musical wavelength, they barely acknowledged each other's
                   presence.

                   A glimpse of the fire and intensity of the old Hip -- a band renowned for
                   its unpredictability that used to see its lead singer dive into the audience
                   -- finally came during 100th Meridian, when Downie loosened up, made
                   a few dance moves and the music strayed off into unexplored territory.
                   That was more like it, I thought, then realized it was the last song.

                   Oh well. It was back to the book for the encore songs, which included
                   the oddball Chagrin Falls from Phantom Power, a quick blast through
                   Daredevil, and a surprisingly straight-ahead version of New Orleans Is
                   Sinking. That song, from the band's major-label debut album Up To
                   Here way back in 1989, is the one hit that has dogged the Hip's career
                   -- if it doesn't play it, everyone complains. But if it plays it like it did on
                   Sunday, it becomes a cliche, reflecting a rock band that can't move
                   beyond its biggest hit.

                   The big finish, the final encore, was a sizzling Blow At High Dough,
                   another anthemic hit from that breakthrough Up To Here album, which
                   sparked a palpable rush of enthusiasm from the audience. For the first
                   time all night, people in every corner of the arena were on their feet,
                   hands in the air, shouting the lyrics.

                   While that one song probably left most fans satisfied, especially those
                   seeing their first or second Hip show, it didn't do much to quell one
                   nagging question in the minds of longtime fans: Has the Hip peaked?

                   It's almost a sacrilege to think such a thing of Canada's top rock band,
                   but I can't help but recall those musically sloppy but wild, intense and
                   unpredictable shows the Hip played in the early '90s. Sunday's concert
                   didn't come close. Still, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt
                   -- maybe Sunday was an off night.

                   The opening act, Toronto's By Divine Right, was a pleasant surprise.
                   The band's set, which included songs from their forthcoming CD, Bless
                   This Mess, showed a sharp sense of pop songwriting combined with
                   solid rock musicianship. It wasn't perfect, but it was pretty darn good.

                   And you have to hand it to them for reminding a crowd what it's like to
                   be on stage doing something you love. Sad to say, but it looks like
                   Tragically Hip could use a refresher course.