Going into the concert I was a bit worried that the venue would be all wrong for I&W. Sam is one of my favorite singer/songwriters, I really wanted to be able to sit down to watch him. Seeing him last year at Town Hall was perfect, great seats, great sound. Since his first release and thru the latest, I&W has shown progress not only as a musician and writer but also a band leader. No longer is he solo, the band is ever evolving. Last night the 7 piece band was very tight moving from one style to the other.
That's one thing that really stood out to me about the progression of his sound, he is still the acoustic folky guy that most of us fell in love with, but now his sound encompasses jazz, bluegrass, country and his most recent venture seems to be jam based. He even asked us if we had the room to dance, which was unexpected, until he busted out a 10 minutes jam in between verses of a song. The band pays attention to the details. The music is full, lush, deep and strangely small and large sounding at the same time.
The setlist included a good selection of older tunes, while mostly playing selections of the last record "The Shephards Dog". What I find so fascinating and intoxicating about I&W is how he adapts every song for the full band. Nearly every song he played with the full band, was significantly different than the album version. All longer, more drawn out, changes in tempo and even in song structure, adding room for the music to breath. Most of the times i think he connected on improving the song, but one or two did not. A few of the songs seems a bit looser then they should, boy with a coin and house by the sea were not as good as on the album. He played 3 or 4 new tunes and i thought they all sounded excellent, and the crowd seemed to appriciate most of them as well. Its good to see him working them out live, hopefully that means they will be ready when it comes time to record again.
Sam was much more lively and talkative than the last show at town hall, which he alluded to. He seemed to enjoy the loud and often obnoxious NYC crowd, when the usual call for "freebird" was heard, he obliged to play the song for a few seconds, saying "you get what you ask for, bitch", the place went nuts, he had a big smile on his face, it was awesome. He showed alot of personality onstage this time. Vocally he was perfect, i don't think i heard an off note all night, the same can be said musically. While it still would have been nice to see him in a larger seated venue, (Radio City would be magical), the show was still fantastic, and i cant wait to see him again.
I did not get a set list, but i know he played: Sodom south Georgia, each coming night, boy with a coin, upward over the mountain... Resurrection fern was a highlight to me. He did not play Innocent Bones, which i really would have liked, or Naked as we came, still a very good overall selection of tunes. It sucked to be standing and have the show start at 10:15 on a Monday night, and i still dont like the venue at all, but that was an amazing show and i will got back again for the right act
