Day Five: The End of the Show Run
Last night of my five night show run and it was awesome. I went to Good Records before the show (conveniently in the same neighborhood) but didn’t spend a bunch of time there because I was cutting it close on time. I got to the Granada and the one of the door guys remembered me and my Cali license and the guy giving me my wristband paid me the “you don’t look your age” compliment. Right on. So I grab a couple of slices of pizza (really good) and a Shiner and made my way to the balcony and the sound booth. Still a spot open though the first opener had already played.
The second opener was Vega4, a quartet hailing from Ireland (Johnny, the lead vox and guitars along with Gavin, the bass player), New Zealand (Bruce, lead guitar), and Canada (Brian, drummer). I have a promo copy of their album “You and Others” and there were definitely some good songs on it, so I was excited to hear them play. They started out strongly with “Tearing Me Apart” and then “Traffic Jam” and meandered through a good portion of the album. Johnny has great stage presence and was super talkative, which if you don’t know by now, scores high points with me. They ended their set with “Life Is Beautiful”, with John and Jared from Augustana joining them. Johnny was way fired up and made it into the crowd to sing a bit and then climbed up the rigging on the side of the stage. Good stuff. I asked the photog if anyone had ever done that and he told me that there had been attempts but it was the first time someone succeeded.
After a short stage change, the Augustana boys came out. I was not stressing about getting the set list since it was in front of me the whole time, so I really got to enjoy the show.
They started out with “Wasteland” and then went right into “Bullets”. Good songs to open with as the crowd was feeling it after those two. After “Stars and Boulevards”, Dan introduced a new song, called “Either Way I’ll Break Your Heart Someday”. That led into “Sunday’s Best” and “Hotel Roosevelt”. Next was a new song, which I didn’t quite catch the name of, but it is listed on the setlist as “Heart-Shaped”. That led to another new song called “Still Ain’t Over You” where Dan busted out the harmonica. Dan was really feeling the acoustic vibe at this point and added a song on the fly, one he wrote for his daughter, called “Meet You There Someday”. The three new songs were very well received; I had heard “Either” and “Still Ain’t” the last time I saw them. The band is really meshing well together - as I noted last time I saw them, the addition of John on keys was a good thing. After the short acoustic set, Jared came back out on stage and they gave us “Lonely People”, then a new song called “Dust” and then “Coffee and Cigarettes”. I love “Coffee and Cigarettes”. I listen to this album at least once every time I get on a plane just because I love singing the lyrics..."so put me on a plane and fly me to anywhere....” Dan put his guitar down at that point and sat down for “Boston”. Yes, there was a sing along of the “you don’t know me, you don’t even care....” lyrics. Dan improvised a bunch of lyrics at the end. Then they left the stage for a bit and came back to do “Mayfield” as the encore. These guys are really on their game right now. They are headed back home to Cali and I am coming home to catch their show in San Diego on Saturday. I love seeing a band more than once during a tour; you really get a good sense of what they are like night in and night out.
Speaking of their show when they come home, I still have a pair of tix to give away, courtesy of Vega4’s record label. If you’re interested, hit me back in comments or email me.
