I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: May 16, 2018] Courtney Barnett

 I’ve enjoyed Courtney Barnett since I first heard her a few years ago.  I had also heard that her lives shows were fantastic and put her high on my list of artists to see.

So when she and Kurt Vile did a tour together Sarah and I were right there.

But that was a different thing altogether.  The Kurt and Courtney show was pretty laid back and folkie.  Whereas Courtney’s solo music tends to be loud and confrontational.

So when she set out to tour for her upcoming album (which came out two days after we saw her), I grabbed tickets right away (they sold out by the end of the day).

The show started, the stage was bathed primarily in red (like her album cover) and she started “Hopefulness.”  It sounded terrific.

She told us that she was going to play the entire new album start to finish.  I have been to a couple of “album release” shows, but never one where the band played the whole new album front to back.  It was a neat experience.  You get to judge these brand new songs on the live performance, but you also get to watch a live performance from a great artist.

Then she played “City Looks Pretty.” and “Charity” and I realized that I liked every song she was playing.  I wasn’t surprised because the single “Nameless Faceless” is so good.

In fact, I loved every song on the record.  They were uniformly catchy (I didn’t understand all the words, but that’s okay) and the overall sound was just fantastic.

As part of getting a ticket we also received a copy of the album, which I have yet to listen to.  I’m slightly afraid that the album won’t be as great as the live experience was.

Obviously there was huge reaction to “Nameless Faceless” which was even better live.  There’s something about the way Courtney is is such a great noisemaker but is such a quiet person when she speaks.  It makes the live juxtaposition spectacular.

In addition to Bones Sloane on bass and Dave Mudie on drums, she had Katie Harkin on keys.  The keys were an excellent addition to the new and the old songs.  But more importantly, Harkin’s vocals were a fantastic addition.  Especially for the new songs (they were essential in “Nameless Faceless”).

I also really liked the follow up song that I had heard about called “I’m Not Your Mother, I’m Not Your Bitch” (my daughter doesn’t like this one).  It just had so much aggression built in, and it intense to see her play it.

The only slightly bad thing was that because she was playing the new music from start to finish there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for her to improvise–to just solo wildly.

She saved that for after the album was done.

I knew she’s play more songs and I didn’t care if she played the same ones she played with Kurt or not. She opened with “Avant Gardener” which we saw with Kurt but which was very different here–louder, more raucous with Courtney’s excellent intense singing.

She played two mellower songs from her 2 EPS collection with “Small Poppies” being a moody bluesy number with a wild solo.  It was followed by the more rocking “Elevator Operator” and the wildly raucous “History Eraser” with some great backing vocals from Bones Sloane (and I actually got a picture of him this time!

She went off stage from an encore and Sarah and I wondered if Jen Cloher was in town to come out with her.  But instead, we got the more obvious (but still exciting) Philly guest Kurt Vile!

Even though we had seen them together last time, this version was very different with Kurt playing electric guitar and singing along.  The two songs they did together had a much more rocking feel than the previous time.

They did two songs that they had dome together last time.  “Over Everything” sounded great and the crowd was totally into it.  It was obvious that Kurt had fun with “Depreston.” He sang “backing vocals” and played a lengthy solo too.

Then Kurt left and Courtney finished the show with a fantastic version of “Pedestrian at Best, the one song that Sarah and I wished they had played last time.  This version totally rocked and Coutney had a chance to really wail on guitar.

She is a Scorpio!

I marveled once again that she lays everything without a pick, just strumming hard with her fingers.

She didn’t talk a lot

Tell Me How You Really Feel

1. Hopefulessness
2. City Looks Pretty
3. Charity
4. Need a Little Time
5. Nameless, Faceless
6. I’m Not Your Mother, I’m Not Your Bitch
7. Crippling Self Doubt and a General Lack of Self Confidence
8. Help Your Self
9. Walkin’ on Eggshells
10. Sunday Roast
12. Avant Gardener
13. Anonymous Club
14. Small Poppies
15. Elevator Operator
16. History Eraser
17. Encore:
18. Over Everything (Courtney Barnett & Kurt Vile song) (with Kurt Vile)
19. Depreston (with Kurt Vile)
20. Pedestrian at Best