The Feelies at Bowery BallroomSo Bruce and Rock & Co. cancelled on me and my fellow New Yorkers - From the Jam for no obvious reasons cancelled most of their U.S. tour, just to announce gigs in Vienna, Austria, a few days later. Hm. Didn't they say they want to have a new record out by the new year, anyway? Maybe Paul Weller has some songs he can spare?
Enough already, now for one of the greatest reunions ever: The Feelies played two well packed shows at the Bowery Ballroom in the original line-up, Bill Million rejoining the gang for the first time in 15 years. And boy, were they good! My friends and I saw them decades ago in Zurich and were blown away, but honestly, i think this was even better. Glenn Mercer is by now one of the best and most precise guitar players i have ever seen, Million is the glue that bindes the band together. Looks like only the two drummers ever smile - the strings work and sing like a manic machine, strumming and pumping ahead, spinning melancholy and melody. Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo in the front lines with an open mouth. A frenetic audience, but where were you Brooklyn hipsters? These are the masters you could learn so much from!
I saw the Feelies on Saturday in Boston, and I am still in shock at how great the show was. Since 1987 or so I've been calling them the best live band on earth, but I was still surprised that they could still bring it after all that time off. (Bill hadn't picked up his guitar since the break up until a year or two ago.) People who saw them in September and on Saturday said that Saturday's show managed to be an improvement, believe it or not.
ReplyDeleteI saw Brenda smile a few times at the cheers of the adoring crowd. I even saw a smile from Bill...but that was a smile due to their screwing up at the end of "She Said, She Said".
thanx, daniel. anybody ever seen mr. mercer smile on stage? then again, as mr. privateman used to say: do you smile when you work?
ReplyDeleteFeelies? Just deep fascination. Best thing from the Garden State since ... the Garden? Should have gotten that Sopranos Soundtrack. Hope I die before they get old, haha. Wanna see them live, desperately. Eternal love, from the Garden State of Switzerland.
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