1. Esquires = Ryan Adams (vocals/guitar) Gillian Welch (bass); David Rawlings (guitar) and David Steele (drums).

2. Ryan's comment:  “We just wrote these last week.”

Online Review by Miles Goosens:  “Ryan Adams & the Esquires provided the biggest surprise of the evening for me. I never was on the bandwagon for Ryan's (former?) band, Whiskeytown. Though I liked them fine, they never struck me as deserving of the "alt-country Replacements" hype that surrounded them a couple of years ago. Come to think of it, I never was on the "Replacements are the last great rock band" bandwagon either, but I digress. Anyway, Ryan walked out with the Esquires, a surprise unto itself since the Esquires weren't listed on the bill (for those who don't know, the Esquires are David Rawlings and Gillian Welch's rock band alter ego) and delivered a stunning set of new originals. All of them were distortion-laden hellhound-on-my trail electric swamp-blues epics, with barely a trace of Whiskeytown in 'em. In fact, the thing that kept occurring to me during the set was "Dream Syndicate," though thinking about it in retrospect, I think Ryan's just come up with the album that P.J. Harvey should be making. Even more remarkably, Ryan mentioned from the stage that he and the Esquires wrote them all just last week! It sure didn't show -- Ryan and the band played as though they'd been on tour with these songs for years. They closed with a rousing if lyrically sanitized "Brown Sugar" (opting for "just like a *young* girl should"), and left me hungry for more. Ryan said something about having moved to Nashville during the last few weeks, so man! Will Rigby *and* Ryan Adams joining our hoppin' scene...”

See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/whiskeytownavenues/message/3009 for a fan review.