gig review: the pixies @ freeborn hall, davis

[rone]

I picked Sam up and then braced myself for rush-hour traffic through San Francisco and across the Bay Bridge, then Sacramento-wards. It was brutal, but we managed to make it on time; although Mapquest failed to provide actual directions once it led me onto the UC Davis campus, there were good enough signs that pointed to Freeborn.

Quitter opened with a seven-song set; they were a bit mopey at first (the opener, "Creations in the Fire", sounded like a Radiohead cop, with dissonant keyboards at the bottom), but their set picked up, until the final song, which seemed to cause the energy they'd built up to fizzle. Still, they were good enough for me to buy their disc, sender.receiver. I'm listening to it now, and enjoying it.

Between the bands, the soundman played the first cut off A Perfect Circle's Thirteenth Step, but then he switched to Hüsker Dü's New Day Rising. That was nice, and it set the mood perfectly for me.

There's one thing the Pixies have definitely lost: hair. David Lovering looked a lot like Tommy Chong. They all looked older but wiser. And they knocked us all on our asses.

• Bone Machine
• Wave of Mutilation (they messed up the beginning of the song; it sounded like someone was off a measure, but Sam thought someone might have been playing a different song)
• Number 13 Baby
• Caribou
• Subbaculcha
• Dead
• Debaser
• Monkey Gone To Heaven
• Broken Face
• Something Against You
• Isla De Encanta
• Gouge Away
• Tame
• Levitate Me
• Hey
• Here Comes Your Man
• Holiday Song
• Nimrod's Son
• Where Is My Mind?
• Vamos (Joey Santiago goes fuckobazoo on the guitar)


Encore


• Velouria
• U-Mass (at this point, i turned to Sam and said, "i wish they'd played 'Gigantic'", assuming they'd close with 'Wave of Mutilation [UK Surf]')
• Gigantic ("YYYYYYYEEEEEEAAAAAAAAHHHHH!")

"Velouria" felt almost anti-climactic as an encore... weird. Sam bought the DiscLive recording of the performance, which was available a mere 10 minutes (plus waiting in line) after the show. It's a brilliant idea and now that we have the technology available to pull it off, i think every damn band could benefit from it. We noshed at IHOP and headed home... i'm sleep-deprived, but i feel great nonetheless. A killer show, with a good audience (crowd-surfers! it's 1991 all over again!).

Comments

[rwx.livejournal.com]

Disclive is great. I ended up getting ones from both shows because the feel was so different at them. The Victoria show had people in their mid30s crowdsurfing, which was astounding and outstanding.

--Corprew

[littleamerica.livejournal.com]

A couple of days ago Large Hearted Boy linked their show in Minneapolis a couple of weeks ago here (http://www.tibagito.interconectado.net/mp3/). It's well beyond solid.

[bebopmonkey.livejournal.com]

Was there a mosh pit? I miss mosh pits. Its seems like fans in those were better... drunker, sweatier, and more violent. *sigh*

This Disclive thing sounds intriguing, though. Thats actually great too, cause its beating bootleggers to the punch. Good for them

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Not an actual mosh pit, no. Lots of bouncing, though. A few girls were wearing flip-flops... smart.

[dreamcarnival.livejournal.com]

i'm so jealous!

[lusercop.livejournal.com]

This review is sounding like good news for seeing them in a month or so at Brixton in London. :-)

[schwa242.livejournal.com]

Sigh... so very very jealous.