Just wanted to be the first to report back from the great show at the Commodore in Vancouver.
I didn't here about it until 5:00 then went down with my roommate as soon as we could, we arrived in line at 6:00 PM then, got in around 9:00.
I'm sorry I can't remember the opening band's name, John something...they we're really good, I'll check them out further.
The venu holds about 1000 people, and I was able to be in the front three (standing) rows, the closest I've ever seen them.
Here is a partial set list - as much as I can remember anyway.
Tiger the Lion
New Orleans
Boots or hearts
Grace too - (I think they opened with it)
Lake Fever
Poets
Courage
Stay
Emergency
Fire in the hole
the compleatest
Encore-
Freak Turbulence
100th Meridian
Great show, great venue, great band, great cause.
Can't wait to see them again tomorrow night.
Craig
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Well, luckily I made it in! Great show -- a little mellow, but a good
warm-up I think. :)
I'm a little tired right now, but I'll be sure to post a full review tomorrow... Anyway, here's the setlist, as best as I can remember (order of the middle is essentially wrong, but the first few, and encore are correct at least):
_____main set_____:
Grace, Too
My Music At Work
Fully Completely
Giftshop
Puttin' Down
Springtime
Lake Fever
Poets
The Completists
Wheat Kings
Boots or Hearts
Courage
Stay
Nautical Disaster
Tiger the Lion
NOIS
Fire in the Hole
_____encore____:
Freak Turbulence
Bobcaygeon
100th Meridian
I might be missing one or two, and I'm sure it's out of order, but that's the general sense of it at least. I saw someone post a bit earlier that Emergency was played, but I don't recall it (it would be foolishly incredible if true)...
I saw at least two people with video cameras, so hopefully a copy will
turn up. Didn't see anyone with audio recorders... The show was too short
notice for me to come up with one myself... I'll try to record tomorrow's
and Thursday's shows to minidisc, but the only mic I will be able to grab
is a Shure SR48 or some such (pro vocal[?] mic that a musician friend of
mind has).
-Cam
=================================================================================
"i said it so you know it's true"
alrighty, it's almost 2am and i just walked in the door. got a message at about 8:30 this morning, just as i got to school. i headed right back out to the busloop and straight to the commodore. sat outside from 9am until 6pm in what had to be near zero degree weather... brrrr..... not much of a lineup until later in the afternoon, but diehards being diehards, we stayed there... and of course, most of us were not dressed for sitting outside...
i was so psyched to get in there... i honestly thought it was going to possibly be the best of the 18 or 19 hip shows i've seen to date - but that idea was quickly put to rest, through no fault of the band. the crowd was pretty wild and i could see gord downie and the other members keeping an eye on the crowd. for me, it's kind of hard to enjoy the show when you have to beware crowd surfers (nothing pisses me off more than those losers who after booting everybody in the head once, go back and try and do it again), and you have a bunch of obnoxious morons trying to push everyone out of the way, and guys shoving smaller women aside... had to concentrate more on staying alive than on the show itself. this is however not meant to be a criticism of the band in any way. i wish fans would treat each other with a little more respect - it's nights like this that i'm surprised (and thankful) that nights like roskilde don't happen more often.
the setlist - what i can remember of it - and not in order:
nois, boots, courage, meridian, wheat, grace, fire, nautical, gift,
springtime, poets, bobcaygeon, m@w, tiger, lake fever, puttin,
completists, freak turbulence.
take care of each other,
oded
=================================================================================
TRAGICALLY HIP! I just went to the surprise show at the Commodore in
Vancouver, they announced it this morning but I didn't here of it till
5:00 pm, I raced down with my room mate, waited in line, in the cold (relative,
it is Vancouver after all.)
for three hours then got to see Canada's biggest band in a 1000
person venue, as opposed to the 20 000 person GM Place,
where I'll see them tomorrow night. They we're great, I was right up
front it was an open floor so you got a good feeling of community from
the people around you, I think everyone had a great time. I have a bunch
of digital stills I'll put up tomorrow.
-Craig Burton
=================================================================================
Howdy folks.
The recent comments about the lack of West coast reviews has spurred
my normally lazy lurker mind into motion. Since I was lucky enough to make
it to all three of the Vancouver gigs, I'll be reviewing each in turn.
I'll post each separately however, so
as not to put too great a load on file sizes etc...
Here we go:
SHOW ONE: THE COMMODORE
My alarm woke me up at about 7:30 Tuesday morning, and I just caught the tail end of some kind of announcement. "...Tragically Hip, and can only get tickets by lining up..." I shot out of bed, WIDE awake (normally I'm a three times snooze button kind of guy), and turned on my stereo (one of the joys of single-room UBC rez life is there's very little distance to travel), and sat at my desk in my boxers for about a half hour, until the announcement was repeated. "The Tragically Hip are playing a surprise show tonight, at the Commodore Ballroom. The only way to get tickets is by lining up at the box office. No contest winners. Tickets are $25, and all proceeds go to the Greg Moore Foundation. They go on sale at 7:00 this evening. There will be an opening band at 9:00 and the Hip will be playing at about 10:00. People are lining up already, so get moving."
I was pumped. Even though I already had tickets for two Hip shows that week (something most of my friends thought was excessive already), I knew I had to go to this concert too. I wrote a few notes giving the info, and slipped them under the doors of folks I thought would possibly want to come with me. I posted another in the bathroom, in case I forgot someone, and headed to class. (I would have normally just taken the day off to line up, but my 3-hour morning class has mandatory attendance, so my lining up was somewhat delayed.)
Got back home at 12:30 (ducking a class at each of 12:30 and 1:30 respectively), and grabbed some quick grub. Asked around to all the people I could find if they were going to come, and they all copped out. Said they had too many midterms, or too much studying to do. Liars. ;)
Decided to go it alone, but remembered about a friend off-campus who's a big big fan -- and not going to school so I would get no weak excuses from him. Called him up, and he agreed to meet me down there. I grabbed my books, a sandwich for dinner, and a warm jacket, and headed down.
I arrived at 3:00 in the afternoon, or so. The line stretched down the block to the corner, all the way around down to the next street, and was just turning the corner when I made my entrance. I was fairly worried, because I figured I'd be too late by this point, so I hurried to the end of the line in case my buddy had arrived before me. He hadn't. However, the security patrolling the line informed us all that the line was currently only about 155 people long -- it was just really spread out. They said they expect to let in about 700 or 750 people total.
Heaving a sigh of relief, I pulled out my books and sat down to get
some studying done. Since I had two quizes the next day, and a midterm
coming up that Friday, and my evenings would all be taken up with the Hip,
I figured I had to learn whenever I
could manage.
Security informed the line of a number of rules: 1) One ticket per person
only. 2) All the $25 goes to the charity, not just the "profit". 3) No
holding places in line for friends. 4) Once you got your ticket, you had
to go in right away -- no going for dinner before the show. 5) If you were
to leave the line, you had 10 minutes only. 6) Anyone drinking in the line-up
would be removed. 7) Everyone in line needed ID to enter the show. 8) Any
and all cameras, video cams, and audio recording devices
*would* be allowed. We were told the rules were specifically set down
by the Hip, to prevent any scalping, and to ensure that everyone went smoothly.
We were expected to police ourselves to some extent, as security couldn't
be everywhere at once.
My buddy showed up at about 3:45 or so. He was about 25 or 30 back, so I told him just to come up and sit with me. Everyone in line was going to get in regardless, so I figured it was no big deal.
We continued to wait in line. There was a group of 6 guys all about
25 years old in front of us, who were drinking their alcohol from McDonalds
cups so as not to be caught. Through the course of the afternoon, they
became fairly drunk and obnoxious
-- one fellow in particular was in bad shape (more on him a little
later on). I was surprised as well by the huge amount of pot-smoking occuring
in the line. It seemed that everyone except my friend and I had brought
fairly large quantities of pot with
them, and no one made any attempt to hide it. It wasn't the quantity
of pot that surprised me, but that fact that so many people would smoke
it in broad daylight, in front of security and whoever else might be watching.
Having grown up in Calgary, this was a bit a new experience for me.
Anways, back on topic. The line continued to move forward slightly as
people pressed closer together. At about 6:15, security began ushering
us closer to the box office, and replacing the police line boundary with
more solid metal fencing, presumably to
prevent anyone from sneaking in this late in the day.
At roughly 7:00, tickets began to be sold. At about 7:20, we purchased
ours, and proceeded inside (without being ID'ed, by the way). (A side note:
there were two stacks of tickets, and my friend and I got a ticket from
opposite ones. Mine was
numbered 73, and his 84, which totals 157. It seems very few people
budged in front, which is fine by me. )
After a mandatory (but free) coat check, we found a seat and bought a few beers to pass the time. (At $4.75 each, I was reminded why I didn't come downtown to drink). At roughly 9:00, the openers (John Ford) came on. They were surprisingly good -- unlike the last opening band I had seen (Jean Smith/Mecca Normal opening for godspeed you black emperor! -- what a horrible situation). The band were quite good-natured about opening for the Hip, (as I believe has been mentioned before), comparing themselves to broccoli and the Hip to ice cream ("you gotta have one before the other"). He also said something along the lines of "Well, we got a call from the Hip the other day, asking if we would allow them to play with us. And we figured, yeah, we might as well, they seem pretty nice. And because we're the hometown boys, and they're all the way from Kingston, we figured we'd played first, and let them play after. Oh yeah, and because they're the GREATEST BAND IN THE WORLD!!!". So it seems that the openers are both big Hip fans (as it should be) and were pretty good-natured and entertaining about the whole thing, which isn't something I've seen from opening bands in the past.
After they left the stage, my friend and I headed to the floor to move closer to the stage. We managed to worm our way about ten people back from the stage before the Hip came on. It was during this waiting period that the very very drunk guy from in front of us in line comes back into the story -- he ended up just beside us, and was exhorting everyone around to start pushing. When they wouldn't, he tried to do it himself. Thankfully, a very large gentlemen became upset with him, and forcibly removed him from the crowd.
As we waited, we became more and more tightly packed. It got so that I couldn't check my watch (it's not a standard wristwatch; instead, it clips to a beltloop on my pants), or write down the setlist as I normally like to do at shows (it makes a good souvenir/memory). I was used to this, however, from the previous general admission shows I have attended, so it was nothing really out of the ordinary for me to get buffeted that way.
I'm a relatively small guy though, so the quasi-mosh pit scenario has
never really appealled to me. I try to sneak my way up as far as I can,
and never push or shove someone out of the way. If someone moves aside
or back though, I'll step into the space they leave. Which is why I do
not appreciate being pushed or pulled aside by large, drunk, idiotic people
who feel they have more right to be up close than I do. I have generally
found that there are only a few of these morons. Maybe it's because the
crowd was generally older than me (I'm only 19, so in theory was at the
bottom end of the age scale allowed in), and other concerts have not had
age restrictions, or maybe just because the music of the Hip appeals to
more dumb jocks, but this
concert had a more violent and muscle-bound audience than most others
I've been to. I got shoved around *a lot* and had a hard time trying to
stay close to the stage. i eventually gave up and moved back to where it
was less strenuous for me to watch.
The show itself was very good. Outside of the mosh area, the crowd was fantastic. Everyone seemed really into the show; people were dancing and swaying all over the place. It was really exciting, because everyone was there only to see the Hip, and were only focused on doing that.
Unfortunately, the unruly crowd up front seemed to be subduing Gord
and the boys somewhat. My two previous times seeing the Hip, Gord was goofing
around, dancing and shaking and twitching like we all love to see, but
this time he stood still a lot
more, didn't rant as much betwixt the songs, and generally was less
energetic than I had come to expect. I think his cautiousness was because
of the violent nature of the pit -- especially since it was on "home" turf,
and the first show of a big big tour. His lack of energy definitely carried
across to the rest of the band as well, as they didn't seem to be playing
with quite normal enthusiasm.
I tried to remember the set as best I could, but since I couldn't write it down, it's mostly out of order. I've posted it previously, but I'll just go through and make a few select comments...
Grace, Too
- Of course, the killer opener. I don't know anyone that
doesn't like it.
My Music At Work
- Good crowd reception. Better than most of the MAW songs.
Fully Completely
Lake Fever
- Again well received by the crowd. I think it's because
these two songs are singles.
Gift Shop
- Little bit of an intro without the familiar sound to
the song. (I could tell what it was, for whatever reasons). When the normal
notes came in, crowd went silly.
Puttin' Down
- Less familiar to the crowd, so less enthusiasm.
Courage
Boots or Hearts
- Very cool. The favourite song of some guy next to me;
he went off.
Poets
Wheat Kings
The Completists
Nautical Disaster
- My favourite song of all time. Gotta love it.
Tiger the Lion
- So good. Fave track off MAW, comes across very very
well live, *tons* of energy. The quick pace changes are phenominal.
NOIS
Fire in the Hole
- These last two were a killer one-two punch before the encore break. Left the crowd with a lot of energy.
_____encore____:
Freak Turbulence
Bobcaygeon
- Surprisingly, no ironic screaming at "that night in
Toronto"...Hadn't heard a live version of it yet without that.
100th Meridian
- I was hoping for a bit of a rant, but they kept the
break pretty short.
I wish I had more to say about the actual set, but for
a lot of it I was too focused on not getting hurt to concentrate on the
details. As well, the sound wasn't very good in terms of picking up Gordie's
ranting, so I don't have anything really concrete to mention in terms of
what he was saying...
All in all, I had a very good time, despite the unfortunate crowd near
the stage. I'm glad that I got a chance to see the Hip in a venue of this
small size and intimacy. It was good to be in a place crammed with huge
Hip fans, all there to enjoy the show.
Despite my disgruntlement with a number of individuals, my overall
impression of the night was one of enjoyment.
-Cam-