Well, it seems that I wasn't the only person in Trees who had read the article before Friday night's show. Ryan Adams had also read it, and no sooner had he taken the stage than he and Caitlin began a tag-team of sarcastic commentary about the article. They remarked that Gram's ghost was protecting Caitlin's violin from harm when it fell, that Ryan's rising astrological sign was the same as Gram's rising astrological sign, that it
was an uncanny fact guitarist Brad Rice's old band Finger had a track on the COMMEMORATIVO tribute CD to Parsons and now he was in their own band. And Ryan also said, "You know, just because you admit to owning a Gram Parsons album doesn't mean that you THINK you ARE Gram Parsons". Duh. Apparently this bit of logic had escaped the writer at the Observer. 

Actually, the musician whose name kept popping into my head Friday night was not Gram Parsons - but Tom Petty. Tom Petty circa late 70's-early 80's. Tuneful, catchy guitar-oriented tunes that have some kind of extra flavoring in them that you can't get from a 48-track digital recording in a studio. But I digress....

So, obviously both pissed off but yet somewhat inspired, Whiskeytown put on a great show that consisted of wonderful music interspersed with a running stand-up routine of sarcastic comments about the Observer's article. To an outside observer, to someone who had no idea what he was talking about, Adams must have come off as a whiner. And the truth is, he probably was overreacting to some bad journalism. But like I said before - so what? If people are going to write in to POSTCARD and say that a Son Volt show can be a great show even if Jay Farrar never mumbles a single word between songs, then certainly it must be ok for Adams to say whatever hell he wants onstage as long as he backs it up with some great music - right? 

Don't even bother to ask me for a setlist. I am familiar with STRANGERS ALMANAC, various radio session tapes and the odd bootleg tape here and there, but I didn't hear too many familiar songs Friday night. Whiskeytown's main set had exactly two songs from their "hit album" in it, and other than that it seemed to consist of entirely new material. This
was no attempt to please everyone and play all the familiar songs. The show sounded and felt spontaneous - like good rock and roll music should be in my opinion. The audience also seemed to love the setlist. Though there were a lot of people there who had obviously come to hear their favorite songs from STRANGERS ALMANAC, the reactions to all the new material was never less than enthusiastic. ("Bar Lights" and "Year of the Rat" are the only titles I can remember.)

Before I forget to mention it, I should say that the most unique musical moment of the evening was when Caitlin made her "live guitar debut" (is this true?) as 3rd electric guitarist on a song titled "Fuck You". This sounded like a punk/hardcore cover, but I'd never heard it before. Does anyone know who did this originally? It was excellent!

Despite the great reception gained by the new songs, there was (of course) people who kept shouting out various song titles in hopes that the band would play them. An odd moment for me was when they relented and played "Everything I Do" from STRANGERS. Surprisingly (to me), this was everybody's "date song" for the evening. (Did this song get a lot of airplay or something?) People were all singing/shouting out the lyrics as if they had memorized them and thought they were specifically written for
them. I wonder if Ryan noticed this - his actions later indicate he did. The night's encore began with Adams coming out solo to play a tune, then joined for the next song by the steel guitar/organist, then finally joined by Caitlin for a 3rd consecutive acoustic number. All three were gorgeous and sounded heartfelt, including a wonderful version of "I Don't Care What You Think About Me". I was standing near the front though - off stageleft
- and began to notice that the crowd was getting restless during the 3rd song. Somebody, a girl, kept shouting out "16 Days!! Play 16 Days!!!" - and was finally shouted down by a group that yelled "SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!" loud enough to startle everyone in the building. The girl shut up.  Finally Caitlin had to yell "hey - SHUT UP!" in order to finally get it quiet enough so that people outside the first few rows could actually hear the finish of the song. By the 4th song in the encore, Ryan was ready to exact his revenge on everyone who had showed up and wanted to hear exact copies of the "hits" from STRANGERS ALMANAC. The rest of the band joined the three who were already on stage, and Ryan wlked over to the drum kit and sat down. Then the drummer grabbed a guitar and walked up to the microphone, at which point Whiskeytown began to play their final song of the evening - "16 Days", as sung by the drummer and drummed by the singer. Take that!

Does an artist have an obligation to play everything the audience wants to hear? Does the audience have the right to be disappointed if they heard a great set of original music that didn't include all the songs from an album which is now over a year old? Hey, if you paid money to see the show then you are entitled to your opinion. But surely people who attended Friday's show didn't expect to hear all the old songs. Whiskeytown played all that stuff to death on the last tour and now they've moved on. From what I heard, the new album should be a humdinger. I'll be buying it as soon as it comes out.

I'll be going to see Son Volt for the first time on Tuesday night. From what I hear, they are a bit tamer personalities, and stick to more of a constant setlist, but since most of the advance reviews from that tour indicate the set is chock-full of songs I've never heard then I'm sure I'll enjoy it too. Are they really playing Iggy & The Stoges' "I Got A Right"?