November 4 2005: The Mountain Goats, Mac McCaughan, Ivan Howard, Reid Johnson, Aimee Argote – Duke Coffeehouse, Crowell Building, Duke U., Durham NC
I was hanging out with my best friends Ryan and Heather in Virginia Beach and talked them into driving me to Durham to see this show. It wasn’t exactly a hard sell though, because it was a Friday night and I offered pay for all the gas and both their covers and drive both ways. It was worth it. Especially for them.
As we were walking from the car to the door after getting there I saw John talking with some folks on a fire escape and waved and said hello. He waved back and then a minute later as I was reaching into my pocket to pay the $10 cover John comes running through the door and asks that I be let in on the house. What a guy.
The show was a solo show and Durham is where John lives and it almost made up for my Halloween debacle. I described it later to friends as like the perfect gift for someone who already has everything. Lots of great songs, many of which had not been played on the tour, and many of which I’d never seen before, period. And perhaps most importantly for me was the fact that before the tour I had informally compiled a mental list of tunes I would love to see played, and at the very top of that list was “The Mess Inside,” a song which was not touched once. However, as the Durham show began John started strumming his guitar. I knew he was playing something he had not played recently, but as many if not most of his songs begin in a very similar if not identical manner I was not able to place it until he stepped toward the microphone and out came, “Took a weekend! Drove to Provo!” Absolutely sublime. Other highlights included a particularly moving “Up the Wolves,” “Whole Wide World,”and the first live performances of “New Monster Avenue” and “Hast Thou Considered the Tetrapod?” Towards the end of the show I noticed that my facial muscles were a little sore, likely because I had such a huge stupid grin on my face. I tried to relax the muscles but they refused to do so. I stopped fighting it and just kept smiling.
As we were walking from the car to the door after getting there I saw John talking with some folks on a fire escape and waved and said hello. He waved back and then a minute later as I was reaching into my pocket to pay the $10 cover John comes running through the door and asks that I be let in on the house. What a guy.
The show was a solo show and Durham is where John lives and it almost made up for my Halloween debacle. I described it later to friends as like the perfect gift for someone who already has everything. Lots of great songs, many of which had not been played on the tour, and many of which I’d never seen before, period. And perhaps most importantly for me was the fact that before the tour I had informally compiled a mental list of tunes I would love to see played, and at the very top of that list was “The Mess Inside,” a song which was not touched once. However, as the Durham show began John started strumming his guitar. I knew he was playing something he had not played recently, but as many if not most of his songs begin in a very similar if not identical manner I was not able to place it until he stepped toward the microphone and out came, “Took a weekend! Drove to Provo!” Absolutely sublime. Other highlights included a particularly moving “Up the Wolves,” “Whole Wide World,”and the first live performances of “New Monster Avenue” and “Hast Thou Considered the Tetrapod?” Towards the end of the show I noticed that my facial muscles were a little sore, likely because I had such a huge stupid grin on my face. I tried to relax the muscles but they refused to do so. I stopped fighting it and just kept smiling.
posted by Peter Sohriakoff | 1:02 PM
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