Tuesday, February 06, 2007

Live Hip in London

Fittingly the song to open the night in a hockey arena venue was the new "At the Lonely End of the Rink" before getting into "little bones" and then "dire wolf". The show was actually moving fairly slowing until "fireworks" amped it up a bit with an altered line that sounded like "As well "..loosening my grip on ..." Joe Thornton. This was followed by "100th Meridian" which had a long interlude where Gord mixed in the beginning lyrics of the Eagles "Stairway" but he quickly cut himself off and returned to bash a mic stand and then trade it to a girl in the crowd for her sweater. the rest of the set had better flow with some more phantom power "poets" and "bobcagen" mixed in with other new World Container songs (kids don't get it, family band). They did a solid job of including songs from all eras.(Locked in the trunk of a car, long time running, giftshop, ahead by a century)
The title track of "World Container" was a good new inclusion as was the third last song of the set "yer not the ocean". The last two tracks were actually started as "new orleans is sinking" then switched off to the entire "nautical disaster" before returning to close out as new orleans with a switch to ""..looked up to" London "above, and said - hey man thanks".

After a rather long wait for the encore they eventually did hit the stage again. Another world container track before breaking into Iggy Pop's "Lust for life". It was a rather straight up rendition which didn't waver too much from the original but was fairly representative of Gord's dancing throughout the night - a lil wild, tap-dance affair with a lot of movement. Interesting to say the least. I was worried I wasn't going to hear it but the closer was "Blow at High Dough" and it was excellent. As was the show in general once it got rolling. Another mic smash handed to the crowd and a heartfelt thank-you to music fans (including a mock-painting of us) and they were gone.

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