When tickets went on sale last week for the Winter Arena Tour tales started pouring in from London & Peterborough about issues getting tickets, presale limits and why they sold out so quickly.
A week later it looks like some of the mystery around the Peterborough sale is starting to be explained. The basic issue was that the presale was open to Peterborough Petes season ticket holders, who were allowed to buy up to 8 tickets in advance – leaving few tickets for Hip fans.
1. Lonely End Of The Rink
2. Twist My Arm
3. In View
4. ABAC
5. Drop Off
6. Dire Wolf (!)
7. Gift Shop
8. Fly
9. Fireworks
10. Pretend
11. 38 Years Old (!!!!)
12. Music At Work
13. Luv(sic)
14. Are We Family
15. Kids
16. Greasy Jungle (holy shit batman… this rocked!)
17. Ocean
18. New Orleans Is Sinking
19. Family Band
—
20. Summer
21. World Container
22. Blow At High Dough
Hip fan Big A has just posted Fiddlers Green to YouTube from the show last night in Calgary.
Enjoy!
Inspired Hip brings new music to life at sold-out Mac Hall run
Colourful crowd laps up Downie’s rock machine
Heath McCoy, Calgary Herald
Published: Sunday, October 29, 2006
The Tragically Hip performed Saturday at the University of Calgary’sMacEwan Hall. The band also performs at Mac Hall tonight,Oct. 30 and Nov. 1. The shows are sold out.
So has the revival of the Tragically Hip carried from their latest record to their live show? That was the big question going into the band’s Saturday night gig at the University of Calgary, the first of four sold out concerts at Mac Hall. The Hip answered it instantly from the evening’s opening notes with Bobbie Baker coaxing siren sounds from his six string as the Kingston, Ont., band burst into the bombastic rock of The Lonely End of The Rink, one of the many standout tracks on the Hip’s new album, World Container, released a couple of weeks back.
As for the band’s resident poet, singer Gordon Downie, who’s shamanistic stage presence has made the Hip one of Canada’s most distinct and beloved bands?
Dressed all in black, looking lean, healthy, and happy — which has by no means been the singer’s natural demeanour over the years — he seemed to be somehow reinspired by the songs on World Container.
Those manic, interpretive dance moves of his were as intense and quirky as ever Saturday, but he also seemed to be having fun with them.
The refreshingly simple, love letter of a pop song In View was another one of the new songs and it had fans singing and dancing along enthusiastically. Sure, it’s the album’s kickoff single and people have heard that one, but The Drop-Off went over well too with anyone in the audience who gave it a chance.
And there’s no reason they shouldn’t have, with the tune’s insistent, catchy pulse and Downie’s urgent vocals — which were raving and wild yet tightly focused, the singer dramatically swimming up from the bottom of some dark whirlpool in his mind as he belted out the lyric.
Notably, these songs held up beautifully against the Hip’s classics like the rock radio staple New Orleans Is Sinking, the feverish, acoustic-fired dream of Ahead By A Century, and Fifty-Mission Cap, which brought one of the night’s most heated performances.
Quite simply, the Hip is on a high, better than they’ve been since that initial golden run they had in the ’90s that made the country fall in love with them.
For this we can thank Vancouver producer Bob Rock who manned the boards on the Hip’s latest release.
Rock made his name as the studio wizard who brought heavy metal brutes like Metallica and Motley Crue their greatest commercial success and a lot of Hip fans took to grumbling when they found out he was going to be working with their favourite band.
It would be a sellout, they said. Rock’s perfectionist touch was going to polish away the Hip’s literary soul.
Clearly that wasn’t the case. This band had been spinning its tires for too long now and somebody needed to pull them out of their rut. Rock has done so.
The Hip is wielding rock hooks again, ones that actually pack a sting, and this is something they’ve shied away from for a long time while trying to be profound.
There was a worry though, that in tampering with the Hip’s engine Rock might screw things up in one department where they’ve really never lost their fire, and that was their live show. Thankfully, as the Hip proved Saturday, that was not the case.
This colourful crowd of 2,000 — which included a Stormtrooper, a farmer with a pig attached to his nether regions, and a couple of Britney Spears and Kevin Federline lookalikes — hey it was the weekend before Halloween — left Mac Hall well satisfied.
Those in line for the next three gigs have much to look forward to.
In the 6 shows since WC was released on October 17, The Hip have performed 120 songs – 59 different tracks. Here’s what has been played so far (some of the rarer tracks are bolded):
On Wednesday, October 25 The Hip were awarded a Gold record for World Container certifying sales of 50,000 units in Canada. Congratulations! My quick mental calculations make me think that the second week sales may surpass the first week sales of 27,000 units (considering they moved 23,000 more units between the end of the first week and this Wednesday…)
So, how long until this sucker goes Platinum (100,000)?
We can keep an eye on the CRIA website and track the certification of WC.
Here’s a sample from the show last night at The Phoenix.
Edmonton Journal
Apologies are in order to Gord Downie and The Tragically Hip.
In my story about their new album, World Container, I wrote: “Frontman Gord Downie won’t come out and say his group was on the verge of breaking up, but he does admit the 23-year-old Canadian rock institution didn’t have any plans after recording the first four songs for World Container, in stores Tuesday.
“‘We weren’t convinced we were going to see each other again,’†he says during a brief promotional stop in Edmonton.
“‘There was no tension or anything, but nothing was planned. It wasn’t like, ‘Oh, we’re going to make a record.’ It was like, ‘We’ll meet in Vancouver and we’ll cut a few songs and we’ll go from there.’ That’s about as planned as it got.’â€
As it turns out, I completely misunderstood the Tragically Hip frontman. When Downie said ‘we weren’t convinced we were going to see each other again,’ he was referring to producer Bob Rock. Not his bandmates, like I wrote.
I truly apologize for the mix up. To make it clear: The Tragically Hip were NOT on the verge of breaking up.
Posted by Sandra Sperounes on 10/16/2006 2:26:14 PM
As posted on CANOE — JAM!
Charles beats The Hip, Sarah to No. 1
By JOHN WILLIAMSSenior Editor, JAM! Showbiz
Despite healthy album debuts from The Tragically Hip and Sarah McLachlan, it was a French Canadian artist that made a surprise leap to No. 1 in Canada.
Gregory Charles’ second album, “I Think of You,” blasted to the top of the charts, racking up an astonishing 109,000 in sales, according to data compiled by Nielsen SoundScan Canada.
The album figures make “I Think of You” the biggest debut in these parts since Coldplay’s “X&Y,” which sold 105,000 copies in June of 2005.
Trailing well behind was the Hip’s 12th disc, “World Container,” which checked in at No. 2 with 27,000 in sales, and Sarah McLachlan’s Christmas album, “Wintersong,” which landed at No. 3, selling 19,000 copies.
All the movement up front bumped Rod Stewart’s fifth all-covers disc “Still the Same… Great Rock Classics of Our Time” from the No. 1 position down to No. 4.
The Killers’ “Sam’s Town” sank two spots to No. 5, Evanescence’s “The Open Door” dropped from No. 2 to No. 6, and Justin Timberlake’s “FutureSex/LoveSounds” held steady at No. 7.
Rounding out the Top 10 was Tony Bennett’s “Duets: An American Classic” at No. 8, Diana Krall’s “From This Moment On” at No. 9, and K-os’ “Atlantis: Hymns For Disco” at No. 10.
Other notable debuts included JoJo’s “High Road” at No. 12, Diddy’s “Press Play” at No. 17, Aerosmith’s “The Very Best of Aerosmith” at No. 19, Alain Lefevre’s “Moments Musicaux” at No. 35, Dierks Bentley’s “Long Trip Alone” at No. 37, and Cradle of Filth’s “Thornography” at No. 50.