Just got home from an amazing show in Vail. I've got to get this out of my system before I can sleep. What a buzz.
I went with one of my Who traveling buddies Ozzie, and he became a convert for life.
The show was set up on a parking lot, and it was a very enthusiastic crowd. We were front row center on the rail, meeting perennial front row fan Lisa and her pals. Met some other great new GPN friends while we waited.
For much of the show we were treated to a moderate snowfall which was really cool, but the drive out of the mountains back to Denver was a white knuckle blizzard for at least 50 miles. Not fun, very stressful..
First thing to notice was the new stage set up. Grace's keyboards were positioned on the right side of the stage. Scott was all the way on the left with the the little organ he played on Leno next to him, Benny sort of in the middle right near the organ. Michael Libramento was positioned on the riser next to Matt like on Leno He plays a right handed bass upside down the way Hendrix played his guitar. Michael was very much heard in the mix and I enjoyed his playing.
Grace and the Nocs all came out in blue jeans and layers. Grace's hair is a bit shorter - she looked like a gorgeous Vail ski bunny, but for some reason for me she evoked a kind of blonde "Ann-Margret-sex-kitten" image. (That reference really dates me as an old man I know). Grace had a very different aura than the hot rocker in the micro-mini. She was engaging, and charismatic as always.The whole band was excited to play- you could see it.
It was thrilling to hear the public debuts of some songs. A nice gentleman was able to snap a picture of the set list taped to the stage before the show, so I could write it down in advance and anticipate the new songs to film. (Ones I filmed on my phone are marked with a * --more on this below)
Here is the set list.:
Sweet Hands (great rousing opener)
Oasis (epic as always)
Good Bye Kiss
Apologies
Ah Mary (Wow! if there had been it roof it would have been torn off)
*The Lion The Beast The Beat (This song is a MONSTER!)
Never Going Back
Paris
*Loneliest Soul (mid tempo song with a kind of off-beat sing-songy intro. At one point Grace slinked off the stage and did a little vamping on crates right in front of us)
Stop the Bus (Awesome)
*Stars (slow one with Grace on keyboard)
NBTW
*The Divide (AWESOME bluesy rocker !!!!- might be as good as Beast) which segued right into..
Medicine w/ drum circle (a stage hand threw drumstick to Grace from 10 feet away, which she caught- I thought she can't see on stage?)
*Tush (ZZ Top cover- just frentic)
Now about photos and video- Ozzie has an HD camera but he left the battery for it charging on the wall.
So I was left with filming it on my Evo, which is a decent phone, but I have no idea how these songs will sound. The video is great though, with no one between me and the stage.. I gave the flash card thingy out of my phone to the more tech-wise Ozzie and he will try to get the videos up on Youtube, so stay tuned. Maybe some other fans will post videos too. I am sad to report I did not see tapers.
This show brought it all back to me why I like this band. They were hitting on all cylinders and some parts were so intense!
Exhaustion has caught up to me. Good night.
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Originally Posted by eric
