Jerry Harrison and Adrian Belew: Remain in Light

[King Bob]

At the Warfield, 12/30. TG kindly gave me a ticket, for which I owe him greatly.

X opened, and they were hit and miss. Exene never really sang all the time back in the day, but now she pretty much just shouts. I was hoping for their more country style stuff they evolved into in the later 80s, but they are now back hard into the punk style, which IMO doesn't work as well for such old folks. But they can still play, and there were some great moments where DJ Bonebrake played the vibes and Billy Zoom played sax.

The main even was Harrison and Belew, backed by members of a band called Turkuaz (who I'm not familiar with) playing Talking Heads music. It was a big ensemble with two drummers and horn players. Mostly they played from Remain in Light of course, but some other stuff as well - they did "Psycho Killer," "Cities," "Life During Wartime," "Take Me to the River" and "I Zimbra." The last I thought was one of the high points, with a great Belew solo, and the Hugo Ball Dada lyrics. They also did "Drugs" which surprised me; I would have thought it more likely for Belew to pick maybe "Electric Guitar" or "Warning Sign," or maybe "Stay Hungry;" the last would have been good with this group. The two female backup singers were particularly good, and really made it great for "Slippery People" and "The Great Curve." They did a couple of non-TH tunes, Harrison's "Rev It Up" and King Crimson's "Thela Hun Ginjeet." That last one showed who the real Belew fans were. My very minor quibble is that I would have preferred a fatter reggae style sound from the bass player, but that's just personal preference. It was really something.

It was a VIP meet and greet, so we met the band and got a tote bag, a signed poster (going to frame and hang that), and a laminate (now we're cool like DM with laminates).

[thatguy]

I’d been wanting to see this show for some time… Jerry and Adrian joined another band, Turkaz and played Remain in Light at several festivals, like Bottlerock in Napa, but they were always too far away, or I didn’t want to bother with a festival ticket just to see this show… since then, I think Turkaz folded. This incarnation had many members from a band called “cool cool cool”. Most recently, they performed this at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass last fall, but I didn’t want to do the drive and face the crowds, so I skipped it and figured I’d miss it altogether, but then I saw they added a short west coast run with this Warfield date on NYEE with X. I splurged and got the VIP tix to meet and greet Adrian and Jerry. Having been such a huge Belew fan, I figured I’d never have another opportunity to meet him…

I dragged KB along because I kept saying that we should get together sometime and yet it never happened and time keeps on slippin’ into the future so now it’s been ages since I’d seen KB in person and this was a perfect opportunity to catch up and hang out.

I came up from Marina, had a late Christmas with my son in Santa Cruz, then came to SJ to get KB. 17 was a mess with 2 separate accidents past the summit, so I had to take Old SJ Rd (no big deal since that used to be my regular commute, but everybody was taking it, so it was slow going). Got to KBs on time. Got a quick tour for the domicile and then we headed out, with a stop at Falafel Drive-up which I enjoyed. Haven’t been there in ages…

Up 280 to SF…found the parking recommended by DM pretty quick and then walked across the street to the venue. 

For the meet and greet, they were supposed to let the VIPs register and come in between 5:30-6pm, but they were running late. So when they let us in, they announced that they wouldn’t be doing any autographs and instead gave us all pre-signed show posters (and a tote and a laminate). They had us all go thru security, with metal detectors, but nearly everyone set them off and they just let them go in.

The meet and greet was a bit disorganized, but they finally let our group into the area in front of the stage where they set up a giant backdrop of the show poster with 2 chairs in front. We formed a small mob of about 25 people about 10 feet away from the chairs. Then they led Adrian and Jerry in and they sat in the chairs and we all looked down upon them. For the short QA session we were directed to raise our hands so we could be called on. The first person to raise their hand was a woman standing next to KB and I. She had a very quiet voice and was stammering as you might when you get to talk to your favorite celebrity…but as she found her voice, she broke down and started bawling while trying to explain that when she was a kid, her brother would play his records, like Zappa and make her call out the name of the musicians as they played their various parts on whatever track was his current favorite. She kept going on and on in the broken, upset, overwhelmed manner. It was like sitting in on a therapy session. Finally Adrian spoke up about the power of music and its ability to grab us emotionally. Then Jerry said “but, you had a question?” And the. She continued… 

Finally we got thru a bunch of other questions and wrapped the QA session and they wanted everyone to line up in file for the photos. KB and I were at one end of the QA semicircle and ended up being first in the photo queue. We were to hand our camera/phone to an attendant, stand next to the artists, smile, then move on. The person taking the pictures didn’t make any adjustments, like turning on the flash, and I was wearing a baseball cap and didn’t even think about the lighting, so my pix are all in shadow… Jerry Harrison was also wearing a fedora-esque hat with a wide brim, so his was was fairly obscured in my pix. I hope KB got better ones…

After the photos, they told us to go back to the lobby, I guess for early access to the merch tables, but we already got awesome tote bags and posters that we had to manage for the rest of the show, so we just hung out in the halls and chatted. We went back in to find a spot to watch the show from. We were right up front on the floor, on the right (where the guitar players would be). It wasn’t too packed, but there were a decent number of X fans coming down to the front. Lots of very tall dudes vying for the best view, often unaware or caring that they just blocked the view of a short woman who had a perfectly fine spot until they showed up. I had a humanities professor in college that drilled into us “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny” - am I right, ladies?

X came out and played a fine set. I’ve seen them many, many times, often with KB and they are capable and have a great back catalog to draw from, but they are somewhat tired. They played some new stuff which sounds like old stuff. Always fun to see Billy Zoom play and I love DJ Bonebrake’s drumming. If there was a mosh pit, it was a tiny one, no where near us.

There was a break and the gaps around us filled in. Then the Remain In Light show started. An 11 piece ensemble with horns, keyboards, percussion, and 2 backup singers, one on each side of the stage, doing coordinated dance moves. It was awesome! The music is so strong. I defer to KB’s review for the rest, but it feels like the closest thing to seeing this era of TH as one can get:



…I saw David Byrne’s Utopia show at the San Jose Civic (if you have HBO/Max, I recommend it) and they did a couple of these same songs, like I Zimbra, but this was an entire set of TH from this era and it was so fun…the entire audience was bouncing.

There was an older surf-dude guy in front of us with his two young teens. It was their first live show. what a great first show, but it probably ruined them for live music because it set the bar so high.

—tg

[Drunk Monk]

That kicks ass on my Turkuaz experience http://www.brotherhoodofdoom.com/doomFor...1#pid49941

Did they to The Overload? I was really hoping for that at BottleRock. Luv that track. It’s so power bass oppressive.

[thatguy]

No Overload. No Listening Wind. I was hoping for "Seen and Not Seen" as I used to hum that to my son when he was an infant and wouldn't sleep at night. 

Still great without these gems. Probably one of the best live shows for me for 2023.

--tg

[Drunk Monk]

So when do we see these pix?

[thatguy]

I’ve never figured out how to upload pictures to the forum, only to link to images that exist somewhere else on the web. The 4rum always tells me the files are too large… any ideas? Can someone point me to the instructions?

—tg

[thatguy]

One more time...highly recommended. Ask KB!

Coming to the UCSC Quarry amphitheater on Sunday 6/23: https://www.tixr.com/groups/noisepop/events/jerry-harrison-adrian-belew-remain-in-light-102701

--tg

[King Bob]

Yes indeed! Besides the draw of the headlining names, the band is really tight and the two backup singers are really good. And horn players, which Talking Heads never toured with.