Sunday, February 22, 2009

Rise, Bleary-Eyed, and Report

PHILADELPHIA, PA--Went to see Fountains of Wayne last night, in a full-band acoustic performance. The tix were a gift from a certain pseudonymous blogger who graciously offered us a place to crash and a night off. Wonderful.

Full-band acoustic is a relatively rare thing, even post-Unplugged, But I found it sort of evens out the up-tempo and down-tempo songs, so that, for example, "Red Dragon Tattoo" and "Valley Winter Song" feel more similar than they might seem at first glance.

Anyway, set list. Some of these are new, and off the upcoming record (for which no date was given).

They took the stage to the 50's staple "Theme from A Summer Place," and threatened to play "La Bamba," but didn't.

Please Don't Rock Me Tonight
Little Red Light
Someone To Love
The Summer Place (new)
Fire Island
Cold Comfort Flowers (new)
Hey Julie
A Road Song (new)
Red Dragon Tattoo
Valley Winter Song
I-95
Fire in the Canyon
Bright Future in Sales
Radiation Vibe
ENCORE:
Cemetary Games (new)
Stacy's Mom

Stage banter was, as always, funny and sharp. When the crowd gave only a smattering of applause as a new song was announced, Adam Schlesinger said he felt like The Rolling Stones announcing a new song. When "Hey Julie" required some audience participation, he joked that the song was in "17 time" and after a particularly lame audience member couldn't manage to keep the beat, joked again that she had believed him. When opener Mike Viola (more on him in another post) joined the band onstage, they found him a guitar, because "otherwise, you'd feel like a jerk." And Viola replied "Like Bez," which amused me more than it should have.

Great show, and the new record shows a lot of promise.

7 comments:

steve simels said...

Mike Viola was there?

Holy crap...I would have seen God at this show, I swear.

Kid Charlemagne said...

Sounds wonderful. I missed the show at Birchmere in DC :(

Kid Charlemagne said...

BTW, you can't go wrong with an obscure reference to the Happy Mondays!

Libby Spencer said...

Insanely jealous. I would have loved to see them do an acoustic show. Glad you have fun.

Anonymous said...

Good Lord. How have I never heard about Mike Viola before now?! Sigh. I read the blogs, so how can this happen to me. Thanks for the lead!

DeepKarma said...

I was lucky enough to get tickets for 10:30PM. That was me standing next to the door when you were coming out, freezing my ass off. Loved the show. There were a couple of set changes, but nothing drastic. In the spirit of Steve's shameless blogwhoring, my take on the show is here.

Anonymous said...

Saw the Birchmere show last Thursday with the whole family. My 9-year old counted 4 f-bombs and 3 s-bombs, mostly from Viola. Same set at you listed, excellent as you remarked. A good time was had by all. Wanted to hear the girl I can't forget, but you can't get everything you wan't.