Wilco is such a feelgood band. I'm pretty sure everyone in attendance was just filled with glee over the show. It was long, it was fun, it was personable, it was cute, it was apt, and it was outdoors. All right, so the summer in Vancouver hasn't been exactly beach weather, and the audience here was covered in sweaters and jackets and blankets, towing umbrellas and hats just in case the skies opened up on us. That didn't happen, but there was a healthy cloud cover all night. I think Malkin Bowl is a little cursed anyhow. I mean really, who plans outdoor concerts in Vancouver any time of year? That's just asking for catastrophe. We were lucky there was no rain, but it was still pretty soupy and slippery up and down the hill and down near the stage where the water all collected. Mmmm mud.









Wilco attracts an interesting crowd. A collection spanning butt-length-dreadlocked hippies to backwards-hat-wearing college dudes, with a few skinny-jeaned hip kids tossed in for good measure, the band's decade-plus history has allowed them to appeal to a huge cross-section of artsy-types and folks who just want to have a good time. Performance-wise, the band as a whole isn't classified as grade-A bonkers, but this is pop-folk, so it's not what we expect. What we do see is a mish-mash of Jeff Tweedy's vicious, effort-laden singing faces, Nils Kline's somewhat understated and slinky meanderings around the stage, and drummer Glenn Kotche's unreal intensity when intensity is called for. This is a band that knows how to twist its songs up, have fun, and give the live songs a new flavour from what you'd hear on record. This, of course, is a great thing in a live environment. While familiarity for sing-along's is sometimes nice, it's far more rewarding to get a new treatment on the music.









Throughtout the show, Tweedy took the inter-song banter helm. He interacted beautifully with the crowd, buttering us up by telling us how beautiful it is up here. "I walked up Grouse Mountain yesterday.... that's a hell of a long walk. I took a bus back down." It was their last night in Canada, and Tweedy proclaimed a desire for dual-citizenship. Then it was quiz-show time, to see if we could tell the difference between a saskatoon berry and a gooseberry. "Okay let's test you now... what animal is this back here?" he said, indicating towards the back of the stage. Someone yelled something from the front of the crowd, and Tweedy continued, "That's Glenn, right!" Amongst the songs played from Sky Blue Sky and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (of course), among others, they threw in an oldie, which I think was "Too Far Apart" - I could be wrong on that, as my intense Wilco knowledge base could use a brush up. Following the tune, Tweedy asked the crowd how many of them had heard that song before. "Come on, hands up... that many? Where were you in 1995? We haven't played that song since then. Okay, enough for the wayback machine for now..." and off they went.









The two hour set spanned a double encore and seriously put the Malkin Bowl curfew in jeopardy, but the band looked like they could continue well into the night. To be sure, it was only 10pm by this time and I'm sure the audience could have happily watched more. During the first encore, I believe they were in the midst of "Monday" (how appropriate, since the show was on a Monday), when Tweedy stopped singing, laughed, and while the band played an extended interlude, he claimed he'd forgotten the words, and pointed at someone in the crowd to continue. When the fan didn't step up to the plate, Tweedy declared he was just going to sing the first verse again. A little later, he fired the crowd up by saying he'd tried this audience participation tactic in Alberta and they came through with flying colours. The band got us clapping and Tweedy explained that the band was going to drop out, and we'd have to keep it going on our own and not speed up or slow down or lose time. This takes a lot of coaching for the Vancouver crowd (as declared, "Lord Stanley would be very disappointed." Lord Stanley of course being the namesake of Stanley Park, where the venue was located), and as the band slowly died out with drums remaining the longest, the audience kept on going. I tell you, this is a very cool sound, 2000 people clapping in the dim, breezy night. But, within seconds, clap-reverb started up as people fell into their own different tempos, the pace changed, and even more amusing to hear over the clapping sounds was the audience laughing as they realized they were fucking up. The band came forth to assist again, before relaunching into the song... and yeah, we were all pretty off. Oh well. I blame it on the chill.









As the show drew to a close in its second encore, Tweedy spoke up again about how he hopes to return a lot sooner this time, and that they'll make sure they set up a lot closer to the crowd and "spit all over you". He swept a hand around the vast space in front of him on the huge stage, which is primarily used as a live theatre stage, and then pointed at Kline, who was recovering from a recent bout with chicken pox that had cancelled some of the band's show, and said, "he's still contagious, we don't want to get him too close to you." Through audience giggles, he continued, "No, no, it was raining all day, we couldn't set our gear up..." excuses, excuses. As they prepared for the next tune, someone in the crowd took advantage of the silence and yelled, "Hey you guys are pretty good!" A rumble of laughter through the crowd, and Tweedy turned, looked into the crowd and said, "Thanks... we're trying our best, you know."



That pretty much did it. Check out http://wilcobase.com/event.php?event_key=1047 for a set list from the show, and make sure you see this band play at least once in your lifetime!

Elsewhere

By Andy Scheffler
Photos : Andy Scheffler
Published : August, 2007.