The Barrymore Theatre Madison WI: January 31, 2003
Notable:
A short Dump City, only 3 minutes, and then they go right into a big Divisions.
Between songs, Ryan in a rare move, comes to the mic to say, “how about a little shoutout to Adam Budney and Keven Browning back there, doing a wonderful job. Bob Stone on the side here, and Don Richards in the back.”
Joel says, “Vince Iwinski also in the house.” Ryan: “Sorry, Vince.”
The start Utopian Fir with the slow, buildup of different ambient chords as a band, 4 times, lasting 1:30, before launching into the song.
The random improv segment starts as usual these days with the band doing random “jazz improv” sounds like a scat from Joel, rotating through band member solo bars before breaking it down into random noises. Jake gets his “donkey” whistle-honk noise in there, and they play a few teases including Ain’t Talkin’ ’bout Love (Van Halen), Eruption (Van Halen), You Really Got Me (Van Halen), I Know A Little (Lynyrd Skynyrd), and Unskinny Bop (Poison).
They end the song with Hall of the Mountain King after the reggae verses, building it up with the increasing-tempo as you’ll recognize as the ending of Thin Air.
A nice Walletsworth; afterwards Joel says, “since the last time we were in Madison we’ve got a new drummer; this is Kris Meyers on the drums. We’re very glad to have him here too.”
Brendan says, “Kris is awesome…he had a lot of homework to do over Christmas break, if you guys didn’t figure that out.”
Padgett’s Profile. At 3 minutes it gets a little evil, as Jake solos over a slower-tempo backdrop, like Padgett’s is wont to do.
13 Days gets a royal drums treatment…being a relatively new song, it’s cool to hear Kris getting into it for the odd-meter stuff. What a drummer! He’s giving it his all here in his first week with the band.
Drum solo as 13 days ends, beginning a 12-minute improv segment, labeled “Jimmy Stewart in the track list. These days we might call it a jam as a part of 13 Days.
Hajimemashite comes in with Brendan’s guitar riff and Jake flicking the high neck-strings before the band joins in. The crowd cheers at the recognized feelgood song’s beginning.
40’s Theme to end the set, with some creative rapping from Brendan in the chaos sections.
Labeled “Love Song Intro” it’s a 26-second Jake with guitar picking and Brendan supporting with some harmony on guitar; beautiful.
Then right into Resolution. Reso has a nice jam, and they bring it down Togo into Push the Pig.
After the song, they continue a few bars, change key, and prepare a backbeat and riff to support Brendan and Elliott Peck for the classic Weed Rap, and then they go back into Push the Pig.
Ryan gets up to the mic again and says “Miss Elliott Peck, ladies and gentlemen.”
Jake starts out a soft jazz melody and Kris and the band come in for a 20-minute jam labeled “Jimmy Stewart” in All Things, and just “jam” in the archive track list. The track times are incorrect but if you play the “jam” track it’s more than 19 minutes. At about 4 minutes in Kris changes the rhythm to bring the pace up a bit. It goes into a kind of funk jam with Joel on clavinet I think.
I can hear what I think is Bridgeless (future song) pieces with the guitar harmonies at about 6:40 during the Jimmy Stewart.
At 14:40 it’s like a weird circus song in the jam. Then they warp it and slow it down, to finish the section. Then Joel directs it into a different sound with Kris, a Milestones tease (Miles Davis).
Syncopated Strangers is a great version, followed by the classic and rare A 5th of Beethoven. Played only 32 times, it was originally performed by Walter Murphy and the Big Apple Band.
In The Kitchen: Brendan sings “or what could make me old (like Joel)” for the first time ever! No jam, but all the sections are there now. It’s just a matter time before they open it up to improv. This version is less than 3 minutes.
FF comes in starting with guitar, then Joel on the organ, and Kris brings it together with the Blap of the snare. They break it down after the song into a drums section that lasts 5 minutes.
They go seamlessly into Uncle Wally. After the song, they ask the kid who stage-dove if anyone caught him…Brendan says “I didn’t think that was a mosh pit song.
They play a short punk “unknown song” for him, labeled as Stage Diving Song in the track list. Joel says, “dude, where were you? That was the stage diving song there, you missed it.”
Roulette ends the set.
Encore: Elliott Peck sings a beautiful solo a capella Mercedes-Benz by Janis Joplin. Then it’s Nothing Too Fancy to end the show. At about 11 minute into N2F, they start in on a jam that would eventually become the song #5…I think it’s the very first time they’ve played this riff live. The song would debut in a few months on 5-15-2003 at Stanley Hall, Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.
Setlist from allthings.umphreys.com
Set 1:
Dump City, Divisions[1], Utopian Fir[2] > In the Hall of the Mountain King, Walletsworth, Padgett’s Profile, 13 Days > Hajimemashite > 40’s Theme
Set 2:
Resolution > Push the Pig > Weed Rap[3] > Push the Pig, “Jimmy Stewart”[4] > Syncopated Strangers, A Fifth of Beethoven, In The Kitchen > FF > Drums > Uncle Wally[5], unknown song[6], Roulette
Encore:
Mercedes Benz[7], Nothing Too Fancy[8]
Footnotes:
[1] with In A Silent Way (Miles Davis) tease
[2] with Ain’t Talkin’ ’bout Love (Van Halen), Eruption (Van Halen), You Really Got Me (Van Halen), I Know A Little (Lynyrd Skynyrd), and Unskinny Bop (Poison) teases
[3] with Elliot Peck on vocals
[4] with Milestones (Miles Davis) tease
[5] with JaJunk teases
[6] “Stage Diving Song” played for kid who stage dove
[7] Elliott Peck only; a cappella
[8] with JaJunk tease
Show Notes:
with Unskinny Bop (Poison) tease before Divisions
with Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring (Bach) tease after A Fifth of Beethoven
Links to Audio and Apps
The Live Music Archive app (iOS) and the Taper’s Section app (Android) is a great way to find and listen to these shows. You can stream, download for offline listening, save favorites, and mark shows as already listened to. The app pulls all data directly from the public repository of live music recordings posted at archive.org.
