It turned out that Dulli & Lanegan were doing their show in Seattle the same weekend I was there visiting Susan. She got tickets and we looked forward to the show. I know that Dulli often performed without a set-list back in the day and hoped that that carried over until now. The Showbox is a nice place, considerably larger than the Troubadour (to accommodate Dulli & Lanegan's considerably larger fan-base in Seattle); apparently it's the hip place that cool, mid-level bands play in the city, similar to L.A.'s El Rey or the Palace back in the day. Susan had been there frequently. Dulli & Langean played pretty much the same set as the previous show, which was somewhat unfortunate to me -- still a great show but I had already seen it and I was disappointed by the lack of spontaneity. But at least Lanegan stayed on stage even when he wasn't singing and Dulli didn't let his ego go to his head. And still a great night out with a friend and visiting a venue in another city.
We got there early enough to see Happy Chichester again but the significant opener was Shawn Smith, formerly of Brad and Satchel, and he didn't play any song I knew but the man's voice, a beautiful croon set usually in a falsetto that could run rings around Chris Martin, was a revelation. I could have listened to him blabber nonsense all night, as long as he was singing it with that voice. I don't know why he doesn't get out of Seattle more often but the fact that he never went big with a band is a crime. It's not too late now.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Greg Dulli & Mark Lanegan, February 10 at the Troubadour
Obviously I'm a Greg Dulli fan from back in the day. I had seen the Gutter Twins twice already but missed another show a few months after that and a show that was billed to "Greg Dulli and special guest Mark Lanegan" but not actually a Gutter Twins show intrigued me; even if it was a Gutter Twins show, that'd be enough for me. My buddy Trent is one of the reasons I got even more into Greg Dulli's work and he was able to go to the show with me and we'd had a few drinks before, which seemed appropriate in seeing those two (especially since we weren't smoking or high on something else). The two men, playing a spare, acoustic show with a guitarist and a violinist, mixed up the set, predictably playing a number of Gutter Twins tunes, but also stuff from their own personal back catalogs (including stuff originally by the Screaming Trees and an Afghan Whigs number or two, including "Summer's Kiss" -- nice that they did it but never enough for me), some Twilight Singers tunes, and a few covers. Not exactly like their original bands and not precisely the Gutter Twins, but for any fan of either man, it was a delight.
Happy Chichester opened the show, doing an appropriate opener slot of music I didn't remember after I left but not so crappy that felt compelled to get another drink during his set just to have something to do. And credit for playing "Stupid," the only tune I knew by him from his former band, Howlin' Maggie.
Happy Chichester opened the show, doing an appropriate opener slot of music I didn't remember after I left but not so crappy that felt compelled to get another drink during his set just to have something to do. And credit for playing "Stupid," the only tune I knew by him from his former band, Howlin' Maggie.
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