09 March 2006

The Wedding Present @ Bowery Ballroom - 8 March, 2006

This was my second time seeing The Wedding Present at Bowery Ballroom (I saw them previously in April of last year) and the fact is, the first show was better. Was it because the first time I saw them at Bowery was also my first time seeing them ever (even though I've been a fan of their music depuis longtemps)? Was it that Simon Cleave wasn't playing guitar with David this time? Was it a bad setlist, was the band bad?

No, no, no, and no. The most basic potential problem at any show is the couple hundred other people you're standing there with and this time those people were bad. Real bad. Not that I want to let them KEEP ruining things by forcing me to talk about them and not the band here, but there were a bunch of total dipsticks there last night. Going to the bathroom and asking people to move so I could get by was like running through a gauntlet of high school bullies. People were mad as hell that they had to move for a brief moment to let me by so I could go to the bathroom. Lots of people. And the real kicker were the three or four jerks who rolled up two songs late all drunk and yelling the words to every song. They were louder than the vocals from the band (at first the overall volume of the band was too low) and talked endlessly (and loudly) just about every moment they weren't singing. Was I impressed that they knew all the words? Not at all. Actually I really wanted to take a close-up flash picture of them so I could post it here and publicly shame them by proclaiming them the most annoying shitheads at the show. Obviously, I didn't. But I did see more than one person move away from these guys. Now, all of that shouldn't serve as evidence that the entire crowd were that bad. The majority of people were rocking out, dancing, and enjoying the music. The thing is, I NEVER take note of a crowd being overtly "bad". I go to shows all the time and I can definitely handle some annoyances but last night was just too much.

Thankfully, The Wedding Present put on an excellent show filled with tons of great old songs. They played so many songs (around 20+ probably) that I can't even begin to say what my favorites were. David Gedge has aged, but shitdog he can still play the hell out of a guitar. And sing. And, isn't it awesome when seeing a band live reminds you of just how spectacular their songwriting is?? Last night I was reminded of a great quote from John Peel: "The boy Gedge has written some of the best love songs of the Rock 'n' Roll era. You may dispute this, but I'm right and you're wrong!"

Does anyone have a setlist?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

your comment about the vocals being too low got me thinking about the last few times i've been to bowery and i have to say, i think the sound is not as good as i remember it being. i used to think it had the best sound in the city, now i'd have to give that distinction to either mercury or northsix, though i know the size disparity between these venues doesn't make that a truly fair comparison. moral of this post is that bowery sound system....you are hereby on notice

Anonymous said...

i feel really guilty for not rocking out more at the show. i wanted to but i had my bag on me and my friend bailed so i was by myself but fuck if david didn't rock out. he sounded fantastic (although i definitely agree it was too low at the start they got it loud enough). i wonder how the maxwell's show went off. anyway, definitely a lot of fun seeing him since the last time with cinerama.