Back In Lowell With DSO

We hadn't seen DSO in well over a year.  And though we had a busy Fall schedule, we figured we just *had* to go see them again at their stop in the Lowell Memorial Auditorium on November 9th.  As I've said many times, they're always so much fun.  I have to admit though, that this concert wasn't as fun as I'd been anticipating ... with high expectations and such.  But it was still pretty good!

Memories of the last time we saw them in Lowell were still fresh (rain, pot), and it was a dark rainy night once again.  I got up to Lowell early so as to beat the traffic, or at least get a head start on it.  Sarah and Dave took the train up from work and then walked over to join me at Thirsty First, a bar/restaurant we'd found on the web.  They have an excellent beer selection there and I sampled a few while waiting.  Also made a few friends at the bar.  They were as friendly as you might expect a bunch of youngsters to be (including the owner), and may not have even noticed that I was a lot older.  I told them about the DSO concert that night and they were all dying to go to it (as had been some friends at work), though none made it there (except for me!).  Could have stayed in that place for a while.

Had some quick grilled cheeses with fries when Sarah and Dave got there.  Dropped stuff at the car in the parking garage and then crossed over the swirling canals and Concord River on the way to the Auditorium.  Went right in and it was only half full at the peak of the concert, if you count the large balcony.  We staked out seats (at 258 degrees or so) in the few rows on the rim of the big open floor, and Sarah stayed there while Dave and I crept up close to the stage.

We had read that Jeff would be playing Garcia's Wolf guitar that night and that they'd decided not to do a GD set but to re-create a show at which Wolf would have appeared.  And they did this with their usual creativity: a "1973" show for the first set and then a "1978" show for the second set.
Here it is:

Set One:
Greatest Story Ever Told
Cold Rain And Snow
Beat It On Down The Line
Here Comes Sunshine
Let Me Sing Your Blues Away
Black-Throated Wind
Brown Eyed Women
You Ain't Woman Enough
Bird Song
Weather Report Suite

Set Two:
Scarlet Begonias >
Fire On The Mountain
Samson And Delilah
If I Had The World To Give
Saint Stephen >
Drums >
Space >
Not Fade Away >
Stella Blue >
Saint Stephen >
Not Fade Away

Encore: Werewolves Of London

We had a great time as usual, including some good and puzzling crowd interactions.  The DSO fan world is sui generis.  But I was perhaps in a critical mood.  Jeff hadn't been living up to my (high!) expectations the last few times we'd seen them and I was hoping he'd bounce back.  But he didn't seize the opportunity to lead the band with Wolf.  It was still Rob Eaton's band, though Rob Barraco of course showed his quality.  So it was a bit of a non-surprising night ... the same old thing from DSO.

Lisa deserves a mention of course, with a great backing vocal on the opening Greatest Story and a sizzling Woman Enough.  Also fine playing from the drummers and Skip.  You have to be impressed by the technical ability of this band and their unified creative vision.  I wanted Jeff to rip off one of those incendiary, surprising Garcia leads, but he was too busy watching everybody else, particularly Eaton.

Oh well, had a fine time on a rocking Friday night, as did everyone else there!  We were told that the show was going to end at 11:30 and they may have stretched this a bit.  We were doing fine but when they encored with the sing-songy Werewolves we got our coats on and were out the door onto the wet street as the last verse was being sung.  Back over the swirling waters and then a pretty quick and rainy drive home.