Evan Dando Plays Surprisingly Incident-Free Set at City Winery

Even if alterna-pop pioneer Evan Dando’s

wasn’t one of the finer train wrecks in The Spin’s recent memory, scattered reviews of his current solo tour reassured us that buying tickets to a Dando show is still just as much of a crapshoot as ever. Disgruntled fans and unimpressed critics have recently sent smoke signals through the webosphere, warning of a careworn Dando performing hurried and half-assed sets — still, none of these descriptions sounded quite as painful as watching him attempt to perform The Lemonheads’ landmark album It’s a Shame About Ray in a stifled, scattershot shuffle mode.

Recent reviews make it sound like Dando has made some improvements — and besides, the gamble is all part of the man’s appeal. We’ve seen him hit it out of the park too many times to give up now. The Gen X poster boy has penned some truly timeless works, and any chance to hear him croon them again is too hard to pass up. Even the Misfits and G.G. Allin covers that pop up often in his sets display a distinctly emotional core filtered through his delicate lull and lazy cadence.

The Spin walked into the cozy — dare we say kinda bougie, particularly for a guy with Dando’s reputation and troubled, folkie-punk street cred — City Winery on Friday night after Sarah Johnston's opening set to find Dando already halfway through “Hard Drive” from his 2003 solo album Baby, I’m Bored, the first song of the night. Draped in an unbuttoned flannel over an old T-shirt and a pair of faded, loose-fit jeans, his hair especially stringy and his face sporting what wasn’t quite yet a beard, Dando was alone onstage, hunched over an acoustic guitar. He proceeded to play a set composed entirely of '90s highlights for a sea of tables lit by candles and covered with wine and fine foods. Shit was kind of weird and a little too grown-up for The Spin’s taste, to be honest, but early on, so far so good.

Launching from one song directly into the next with not a word of banter in between, the slacker troubadour stuck almost entirely to highlights from his '90s catalog and his lone aforementioned solo album. “All My Life,” “Hospital” and “It’s About Time” were all accompanied by a faint audience sing-along, just audible over Dando’s sparse arrangements and delicate voice. The acoustics in this room worked perfectly for the fragile nuance of Dando’s voice, which creaked and wavered occasionally.

When Dando dipped back further than ’92, it was for a few covers scattered about the set: Townes Van Zandt’s “I’ll Be Here in the Morning,” Patty Griffin’s “Long Black Limousine” and John Prine’s “The Speed of the Sound of Loneliness.” He also played a rendition of “Impractical Joke” by his '90s college-rock contemporaries Smudge.

It seemed as though Dando was just getting warmed up with Ray’s “Confetti” and the breakthrough “Into Your Arms." But then, to the surprise of everyone but himself, he closed with Victoria Williams’ “Frying Pan." Within just a couple seconds he’d set his guitar on the ground and marched off stage, leaving the quiet room clapping, then cheering, then chanting for a good five minutes before the house music came on, assuring us that the show was over. We can’t say it topped the weirdness of his last Nashville show — few things since have — but it was most definitely another weird night with Evan Dando, and hopefully not our last.