I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: September 17, 2018] The The

I feel like I have always loved The The.  I’d never say they were my favorite band, but they’ve always been a part of my playlists and lyrics from the songs are constantly running through my head.

From the dancey early stuff off of Infected (the first album I’d heard), to the cool “band” stuff with Johnny Marr on guitar (The The was always and forever shall be the project of Matt Johnson with a rotating cast of others) and finally to the beautiful Dusk, which I couldn’t stop playing all through college.   There were other albums, but these three (and, strangely enough the Hank Williams cover album) were staples for me.

Matt Johnson has this voice, the deep resonating voice, that gets right into my head.  Especially with headphones, especially on the beginning of Dusk.  That album is so pristinely recorded it feels like the guitars are in whatever room you are currently in.

I had the fortune of seeing them in May of 2000, the last time The The played the States (and almost anywhere else).  The setlist below I found online.  They apparently played almost all of the then new album and nearly nothing else.  That seems incomplete (and short).

When he (they) announced that The The had released a new song and were doing some shows in England and Europe, I held out hope that they would come across the pond.  I wondered if they’d play Philly, but they didn’t (and that was probably wise as even the Beacon didn’t sell out).  So I got tickets as soon as I could and scored 11th row.  For yes, I was willing to brave the Lincoln Tunnel and an expensive parking garage to see this show.  And having it only in a few locations made it that much more special.

The The recently released a collection called The Radio Cineola Trilogy which was (as this blurb explains)

The three albums are based upon 12- or 24-hour time-cycles and as interlinked as Borromean rings. The End Of The Day: songs/interpretations/performances. The Inertia Variations: poetry/soundscapes/spoken word. Midnight To Midnight: electronic scores/political commentaries/broadcasts. The Trilogy features contributions from JG Thirwell, Thomas Leer, Johnny Marr, James Eller, Meja, Anna Domino, Zeke Manyika, Colin Lloyd Tucker, John Tottenham, Thomas Feiner, Liz Horsman, Charlotte Etc. Tom Bright, Gillian Glover, Willis, Johanna St Michaels, Jacob Sahlqvist, Kate Wilkins, Gerald Jenkins, William Engdahl, Neil Clark, David Edwards/Media Lens, Marian St Laurent, Lucinda Rogers, Neil Sanders, Abdi Assadi, Zoe Hepden, Eric Schermerhorn. Polly Maberly, Niall Greig Fulton and others across the set.

In other words, it’s not new music from Matt.  And I had a slight fear that this show would somehow be reworking that material.  But, thankfully, no.  This was a “Comeback Special.”  And as Matt explains.

For this tour, I wanted to strip-down many of the songs and actually reduce the sonic palette. We won’t be using any samplers, click-tracks, sequencers or synthesisers. It’s just five musicians, performing reinterpretations of my back catalogue. The songs are not intended to be reproductions of the album versions, and many of them don’t sound like they do on the old recordings. Some of the songs do, but if people really want to hear the albums, they should just put on headphones and listen to the albums.

The musicians are himself, of course, DC Collard on keyboards, Earl Harvin on drums, James Eller on bass and Barrie Cadogan on guitar.  Johnson had toured with each of these men on a previous tour (although never the same tour for any of them) except for Cadogan, whom he had not worked with but who came recommended by Johnny Marr.

So, yea, I was pretty excited.

I made it to the theater just as the rain started.

The lights dimmed and then the screen behind the band went bright white and the guys came out–silhouetted against the back.  They opened the show with a song from NakedSelf, the one album I know the least.  But Matt sounded great and the band sounded fantastic together.

And then came “Sweet Bird of Truth” from Infected.  As promised it sounded radically different.  I didn’t even know what song it was until he started singing.  But as soon as I figured out what it was, I was transported back.  And when he switched to the old timey microphone to sing “This is your captain calling (calling),” it was awesome.  Then he played a song I didn’t recognize, but which he introduced in a voice which seemed to fill every square centimeter of the stadium as “Flesh and Bones.”  This was apparently an early single and a song that I quite possibly have never heard before (but many people there seemed to know it).

Up next was another song from Infected, “Heartland,” a gorgeous song with an incredibly pointed message: “Let the poor drink the milk while the rich eat the honey, let the bums count their blessings while the rich count the money.”  The fact that this song may be even more relevant now than during the Reagan/Thatcher years is utterly frightening.  The catchy end refrain of “This is the 51st state of the USA” was great.  The crowd was a bit rowdy before this song, with a woman shrieking the above line as he announced the song.  Thankfully she quieted down and the foolish person who actually shouted a request was silenced soon after.

The lights started to come up on the band and soon enough there were visuals projected on the screen behind them.

Then he moved forward in his career a bit with three songs from Mind Bomb.  For The Beat(en) Generation, instead of a harmonica DC Collard played the melodica and it sounded really good and weird as a substitute.  Meanwhile Barrie Cadogan on guitar played the melody and riff perfectly.

For the beginning of the show we were seated–he told us that he didn’t know what the venue policy was but he invited us to stand and dance during some of these next songs.  Matt told us about how “Armageddon Days Are Here (Again)” was banned in England because of the whole Salman Rushdie affair and that it has never been played on the radio.  It, too is sadly still relevant today.

Last year The The releases a new song called “We Can’t Stop What’s Coming.”  It as the first new The The music in forever.  But as with so much of Johnson’s life, its origin was marked by tragedy.  Andy Dog had died soon after the birth of Matt’s son.  Andrew’s death motivated Johnson to start writing songs again, and the song he dedicated to his brother.

The whole band sounded perfectly tight.  Harvin was amazing on drums, he was playing all manner of pacing and apparently a vast amount of percussion.  But what really impressed me was his touch.  He could go from gentle jazzy brushy drums to some incredibly hard pounding, theater-rattling toms.  He was amazing.

James Eller on bass didn’t do anything flashy but he was essential to holding the music together.  Much of these new arrangements are bass-dependent, where the rest of the band drops out and it’s just bass for a measure or so   This is especially true for “Beyond Love” the last song on Mind Bomb and slow burner.

At some point during the early part of the show he made a joke about technology and how the band wasn’t using any on this tour.  He’d like us to not use technology during the show, either.  He asked that we not use our phones at all. Obviously I had taken some pictures and videos already.  There was a lady two rows in front of us who continued to use her phone–holding it up high, at least I’m discreet–which I phone rather disrespectful.

Then he moved on to Dusk.  Dusk has been my favorite album of his, so I was psyched that he played so much from it.  The first song was the absolutely beautiful “Love is Stronger than Death” and even with a moratorium on video, I had to sneak in a minute or so of this song.  I had no idea that this song was written for Johnson’s younger brother who died (at age 24) in 1989.

Johnson’s decision to walk away from the music industry was triggered by the sudden death in 1989 of his younger brother, Eugene, at a time when The The were halfway through a world tour.

It’s no wonder Johnson muses about death so much.  Indeed, in June, Johnson revealed on Twitter as he travelled to The The’s concert in Stockholm that his father, Edward, died that day, aged 86.

Staying with Dusk but switching from Death to Lust, they played “Dogs of Lust” (Johnson used one of his special microphones for this one as well) and then “Helpline Operator” a song that mingles sensuality and depression.

I enjoyed the Pairing of “This is the Night” with “This is he Day”–very different tones.

During one of these songs, the background projection including what I am guessing is a sketchbook from Matt’s brother Andy.  I was a huge fan of The The  back in the 1990s, but that was pre-internet so we didn’t have access to fairly simple information back then.  I had no idea that the artist who created all of the early The The illustrations “Andy Dog” was Matt’s brother Andy Dog Johnson.

This was followed by a period of, in my mind, lesser-known songs  “Soul Catcher” from NakedSelf (he asked if anyone owned this album) followed by “Bugle Boy” from “Burning Blue Soul” (he asked if anyone owned this album, too).

Then it was time to dance once more for “Slow Emotion Replay.” one of my favorite songs of theirs.

Every body knows what’s going wrong with the world
But I don’t even know what’s going on in myself.

By this time everyone had brought their phones back out so I grabbed a quick viddy as well.

But then he said that it looked like people were still using their phones so we had his permission to snatch anyone’s phone out of their hands and march it up to the stage where the band would stomp on it.  Amazingly the woman in front of us continued to film songs.  The usher even came over and poked her which made her put it away for a bit, but she was right back out there a song or two later.

There was a bit of fun with his Hank Williams cover “I Saw the Light” a song I’ve always liked (his version anyhow).  And then it was back to Blue Soul for “Like a Sun Risin Thru My Garden.”

But the end of the set was designed for dancing and so they busted out “Infected.”  It was so very different from the recorded version–no electronic drums, no female chorus, no horns, just a solid rocking song.

At some point around here Collard stopped playing keys, stood up from his bench stretched and walked around.  Baarrie Cadogan was playing an amazing solo and Collard walked behind him.  Collard picked up the guitar slide off of Barrie’s mic stand and “played” the slide part of the solo (just a few notes, but it was really cool).  Then he proceeded to walk slowly around the stage, stopping briefly to nudge Haven and then he headed back to his spot.

They ended the set with another song from Soul Mining “I’ve Been Waitin’ for Tomorrow (All of My Life) which started off with loud drum crashing from Harvin.  The original of this is all electronic and it was awesome the way Harvin kept up that rhythm–loud and constant for the whole song.

Then the band left for the encore break.

Matt came out with just his guitar and he sang/spoke a somewhat jokey rendition (should I do an American or English accent?) of “True Happiness This Way Lies.” Once the song proper started (not the spoken intro) he took it seriously and it  sounded perfect.  I kept thinking that “Love is Stronger Than Death” would come next as those songs are linked, but it had already been played.  And this was an encore.

Time for “a song I’m sure many of you have been waiting for.”  An amazing version of “Uncertain Smile.”  DC Collard took a really long piano solo.  I love that he incorporated the basics of the frankly classic piano solo that’s in the original and just vamped on it for several minutes.  It was terrific and rousing.

They ended the show with the final song from Dusk, “Lonely Planet,”. with the rousing inspiring chorus “If you can’t change your world, change yourself … but if you can’t change yourself, change the world.”

It was a wonderfully cathartic show and I’m so glad that Matt has come back to doing what he does best.

The worlds too big and life’s too short to be alone

 

Beacon Theatre 2018	Irving Plaza 2000
Global Eyes ⇑	Armageddon Days Are Here (Again) ♣
Sweet Bird of Truth ⊗	Dogs of Lust δ
Flesh and Bones  ⌉	Voidy Numbness ⇑
Heartland ⊗	December Sunlight ⇑
The Beat(en) Generation ♣	The Beat(en) Generation ♣
Armageddon Days Are Here (Again) ♣	Global Eyes ⇑
We Can’t Stop What’s Coming ¶	Soul Catcher ⇑
Beyond Love ♣	This is the Day §
Love Is Stronger Than Death δ	Shrunken Man ⇑
Dogs of Lust δ	Swine Fever ⇑
Helpline Operator δ	Weather Belle ⇑
This Is the Night δ	Infected ⊗
This Is the Day §	Salt Water ⇑
Soul Catcher ⇑	Boiling Point ⇑
Bugle Boy ⊆	Uncertain Smile §
Slow Emotion Replay δ
I Saw the Light ©
Like a Sun Risin Thru My Garden ⊆
Infected ⊗
I’ve Been Waitin’ for Tomorrow (All of My Life) §
encore
True Happiness This Way Lies δ
Uncertain Smile §
Lonely Planet δ

• ¶ = new
• ⇑ = NakedSelf
• © = Hanky Panky (1995)
• δ = Dusk (1993)
• ♣ = Mind Bomb (1989)
• ⊗ = Infected (1986)
• § = Soul Mining (1983)
• ⊆ = Burning Blue Soul (1981)
• ⌉ = early single