watch for my review tomorrow fellow ng-er's; I'm sure I'm gonna piss a few people off with it...  it'll even have my apology to das hip, and a little on tap dancing too.  for now;

Fireworks
Twist My Arm
Grace Too
Thompson Girl
Courage
Gift Shop
Fully Completely
Poets
The Luxury
700 ft Ceiling
Ahead By A Century
So Hard Done By
Nautical Disaster
Something On
Locked In The Trunk Of A Car
Chagrin Falls
Little Bones
---
Let's Stay Engaged
Bobcaygeon
New Orleans Is Sinking
---
Emperor Penguin
Flamenco
50 Mission Cap
 

later y'all,
james 'gord' gamble,
          the travellin' man

>they opened with a hockey song, they finished with  hockey song.
>it was a good night.
>not a blow your mind away night, but a head boppin, screamin, happy
>fun night.

and, unfortunetly,

>Mere hours ago, I had the "pleasure" of attending the second Toronto
>show.  Like most of you, I lined up months ago, and looked forward to
>this night literally every time I remembered that I had a ticket.  Up
>until this point, I thought nothing could destroy a Hip show, but I was,
>apparently, quite wrong, because I had a lit cigarette thrown at me by
>the idiot sitting behind me.

That sucks.  For once, the crowd in our immediate area was pretty uneventful, everyone was cool and no assholes.  A note of 'thanks' to the guy in front of Stac who a) couldn't clap in time to save his life, and b) insisted on booing songs he didn't like.

>would make a coment like "pussy" everytime gord picked
>up the guitar and they were only happy when they played those "hockey"
>songs or nois

Sounds familiar.  I've got some ideas on this after the songs...  I'm worded out, so this'll be brief.

Fireworks:  "So.... what's new?"  I haven't heard Gord open a show with any funnier line.  The crowd loved it, but settled down.  For anyone who cares, Gord was playing gt.

Twist My Arm:  "This is called... cheer up"  Very cool; Gord sang and danced and writhed about like a nutcase.  So why were a number of people booing?

Grace Too:  "This is called... neutral rhymes with orange" - points for originality on this intro.  Gord sang, and Paul looked real funny, like his right leg was chained to the floor and he could only take one step foward and one step back...  it's his usual thing, but to watch him for more than 30 seconds at a time is neat.

Thompson Girl:  Gord played gt; most of crowd sat on their hands.  Despite feeling extremely tired and standing on knees that wanted to give way on me, I was really into this, y'know, giving it my all?  Have you ever been pissed off when a band's getting jeered and tried to get the crowd into it by cheering even louder than usual for the not-so-common songs?  Then you know my frustration.  "Eeeeewwww - what song is *this*?"

Courage:  "All you need is courage... all you need is courage, courage; courage is all you need"  Why is it that when I can't think I can love these guys more they prove me wrong?  There were a couple Beatles/McCartney references in this show...  good to see Gord was having some fun singing what he wanted to.

Fully Completely:  "This is called... India and Pakistan..."  ???? - I'll have to listen to my tapes and figure that one out - I dunno what it was he was singing, there was something at the end of FC too.

Poets:  The floors looked like a bunch of commuters waiting for a GO train at 5 in the morning.  Gord had his gourd, was shakin' it, dancing with it, wooing it, kicking it...  I heard the words 'pussy', 'pansy', a bunch of idiots chanting "Bruins suck; go Leafs go..."  And this wasn't 300 seats either, this was good 100 level stuff so either a lot of people waited in line a long time or paid some scummy scalper a lot; either way they had gone out of their way to..., well, to what?

The Luxury:  So Road Apples is the most popular/best selling hip CD right? You'd think then that people would at least know songs from it?  C'mon, who doesn't know "The Luxury"?  I just couldn't understand things.  The hip were playing an awesome technical show, yet fewer fans then usual seemed to be 'with the band', a lot of them seemed to be displeased?  Why?  Anyway,
Gord opened with a bit of "If You Lived Here" [and if anyone internally at the hip ever reads this; please thank Gord immensly on my behalf for doing stuff like this, y'know, being himself.]

700 ft Ceiling:  Gord played gt; a few people were dancing and singing buta lot chose this and Luxury to go take a crap, get food, etc etc etc.  Itwas cool how the spotlights would turn on to the nosebleeds during the chorus.

Ahead By A Century:  "This is called... We're gonna party like it's 1999!" I'll never get tired of that opener as long as I'm there to see the looks on peoples faces.  This look of fear, like the hip are going to play some sick quasi-version of some Prince song.  Funny, but sad too.  I think Gord even stopped playing his gt at the end so he could get into some rant/snippet/cover.  Couldn't hear it, but at least people were singing along to one song.

So Hard Done By:  "This is a banana... you people up there [points to nosebleeds] can recognize it by its sound."  Blank stares from a few. Insane laughter from Stacie and I.  Normally the crowd gets into So Hard, not in a NOIS kinda way but more like a Scared or Gift Shop way, but not tonight.  Gord even danced to his banana at the end, doing a sorta Pee Wee Herman "Tequila" thing with it.  Know what I mean?

Nautical Disaster:  Finally, something to get the crowd 'back' into things! Gord rocked on his gt and did this cool snippet at the end, something like "It's just about time.... it's just about you and time..."

Something On:  (going....) Gord just sang; don't think he coulda done much more.

Locked...:  (going....) A really different version, with Gord keeping some funky rattle beat going.

Chagrin Falls:  (gone.)  I don't think I've ever seen the Hip lose a crowd - this might very well have been the first.  It was really, really sad to watch.  For a guy like me who eats, sleeps, and breaths the Hip constantly it was painful.  It was this general feeling from the crowd; Stac looked at me and shook her head.  For Gord to be jeered... in Canada nonetheless..., hell it was Toronto!!  I think he knew it too as he had a puzzled look on his face when he finished up CFalls.

Little Bones:  I think in all ways, this was the highlight of the entire show.  I see that it was planned in the setlist and it's just as well.  I think only one other song would have satisfied the crowd.  When Gord hit "happy hour" he started tap dancing.  Yup.  TAP DANCING.  And oh-my-fucking-God was it funny!!!  "it's just a little tired....[tapity tap tap]"  The band stopped, and then do you know what he did?  He turned the mic stand upside down and went nuts.  He did this jig that was just amazing to watch, for about ten seconds or so until the band kicked back in. Christ, was it funny!!!  Everyone was on their feet screaming; and for one moment it was pure classic live hip.
---
End of the regular set.  I looked at my watch and wondered.  It was only 9:51 and struck me as odd that things were going by that fast.  Then I realized that neither NOIS or 100th Meridian had been played.  I listened to the fans around us.  It seemed they only wanted to hear *one* song.  And for the encore...

Let's Stay Engaged:  Gord played guitar for all three songs of the first encore.  I don't think I've heard a hockey rink as quiet as this one.  Sad.

Bobcaygeon:  People cheered when he said "Toronto".  They clapped at the end.

New Orleans Is Sinking:  People clapped at the start.  They sang the words they knew.  The jam starts; Insomniacs and the bit about "I am just a man.."  People sat down.  They sang a bit at the end, then when things were over and the hip started to walk off stage some booed, some left, and some clapped.  Everyone around us wanted to hear one song.  A direct quote: "All I wanted to hear was _______, then we were gonna leave early."  This from the row behind us.
---
Emperor Penguin & Flamenco:  I put these two songs together for a reason. I don't think people were paying attention.  Gord sang a bit of "Jet" at the end of penguin.  It seemed like nobody was clapping.  It was obvious. Gord said, in this I'm-kinda-pissed-but-I'm-trying-to-sound-nice-about-it voice "This next song..... is for this building [few cheers]...... and you
people [lots of cheers]."  Wheat Kings was supposed to be played according to setlist, I think they didn't play it on purpose.  Anyway, Flamenco ended and there was cheering, but not crazy fan cheering.  I can't really find the words to describe it; I guess you had to be there.  There was a pause when Flamenco ended.  Gord looked out at the crowd, Paul and Gordie S went over while the lights were down to talk to Gord about something, then a second later everyone went back and the lights came on.

"This is called.....CHEER UP!!!!!"  Man, you have to hear the tone in his voice to understand.  I listened to the tape as soon as I got in the car, and it was like I thought it was.  They played 50 Mission Cap.  The song ended; Gord Gord and Paul got up and left.  Bobby (wearing a Domi jersey for the encores) gave a wave and left.  Johnny took his sticks and went to the front of the stage to the Zone, made like he was gonna give em to someone, flicked the guy's hat into the crowd, did this maybe once more,
then finally gave his sticks to a fan.  As people were leaving I heard one guy say "It's about fucking time they played it."
---------
[warning!  rant follows!]

Well now.  I got my ideas.  I'm gonna post 'em.  Some people are gonna email/post me, tell me I'm not a hip fan, say I'm fucked, slag me, flame me - fine.  What I'm posting is my OPINION and like a job, a family, or a good time WE'RE ALL INTITLED TO ONE.  I'm gonna break a rule and do something I don't like to do that much and make a statement based on the GENERALIZATION of the crowd.  There were lots of people that were present at the show and don't fit into what I'm gonna say and that's fine.  You know who you are and you know I'm not talking about you.

This is what the GENERAL attitude of the crowd seemed to be to ME:

"Hey, we're TORONTO fans.  The Hip are from TORONTO.  They're CANADIAN, and as dictated by geography so are we.  That means the Hip must like CANADIAN FLAGS and GO LEAFS chants.  We don't like songs we don't hear 100 times a day on the radio.  We're here because we like NOIS and maybe two other songs.  We are the EPITOME of the atypical Hip fan.  So go ahead, play Bobcaygeon so we can scream our hearts out when you say TORONTO.  Yeah, stroke our collective EGOS!  Play whatever the hell you want, we don't care.  Our attitude can partially be expressed in the words of the Power Reporter:  "Yesterday's show highlight had to be the song about the hockey player and the hat. The Hip warmed up with Something On and then proceeded to play the Leaf's anthem, FIFTY MISSION CAP. Will they play it again tonight? "

Yeah, THAT'S what we wanna hear!  Play whatever else you want, we don't care, 'cuz we'll BOO the songs we don't like, JEER the stuff we're too ignorant to know and clap if we like it.  We'll scream out WHEAT KINGS 'til we're blue in the face and until you're so SICK of us chanting it you don't wanna play it.  C'mon, play FIFTY MISSION CAP!  Play it dammit!  We're
TORONTO fans, our city has a HOCKEY team and you wrote a song about it once so that's all we want to hear you play in TORONTO!  You have to play it!!! PLAY FIFTY MISSION CAP!!!!!!!"

And you know what?  It really fucking disgusted me.  The comments from so many people, all with the same insinuation.  It has nothing at all to do with the hip.  It's the fans.  It was sick.  It made me sick, and I'm gonna right now apologize to the hip.

"Gord, Paul, Gord, Bobby and Johnny; I'm sorry.  I'm sorry that I was part of an audience that treated you more like a one-hit-wonder pop group than the established band that you are.  I love what you do, I love your songs and I appreciate the fact that you have given your time to come and play for the fans, night after night, even though some people don't appreciate it.  I feel bad just having been there - it was bad crowd karma.  I'm sorry if the show wasn't good for you, and I hope you understand that there were a lot of true fans there that loved every second the five of you were on stage.  I hope you'll come back to our area soon - we'd love to see you again; but let's do Copps instead, okay?  The geography's a little friendlier just a bit down the road"  [part of an email I'm sending the hip]

Well, does anyone agree with me?  Partially?  Not at all?  I'll stand by my remarks.  I've said my bit for the night, let the debate begin.

james 'gord' gamble,
          the travellin' man