Double Nichols, part one
You never really know what you're going to get at a Lucero show—but you do know the evening will involve some combination of drunk dudes (on or off the stage), beers raised in tribute and plenty of shouted requests. Friday night's show was the first in a pair of dates at Mercy Lounge and by the time we arrived the show was already sold out and there were only 100 tickets left for Saturday—much to the chagrin of the couple in front of us in line.
We did roll up to Mercy a touch late, but still managed to catch the bulk of the Dexateens' set. Their ragged country-tinged rock was the ideal pre-game for Lucero's, well, country-tinged rock—and therefore many in the audience took their set as the opportunity to get drunk. Real drunk. By the time the quartet from Memphis took the stage with "That Much Further West," the crowd was at a heady froth.
Most of the more rambunctious activity was confined to the front of the stage where beer was being sprayed locker-room-post-championship style and the occasional rube went crowd surfing, trusting his skull to the drunkards below. We decided to stay safe and in the back where the more low-key fans quietly mouthed the words and a couple of girls—who didn't seem to be paying much attention—discussed an upcoming Dave Matthews Band concert. (We recently found ourselves subconsciously singing along to "Stay" in T.J. Maxx and pondered the invention of a miracle machine that could erase all DMB songs from the afflicted's head without pain.)
Staying out of the fray ended up being a wise decision, as we watched some shove-happy drunkies being led out by security. At one point frontman Ben Nichols quipped, "I went to a boxing match and a Lucero gig broke out." As for that Lucero gig, it was packed with old classics like "Nights Like These" along with a whole slew of dreaded "new songs" (the band is working on an album with plans for a summer release). The foursome seemed loose and happy—Nichols couldn't help but giggle when he messed up some lyrics only to have the correct ones fed to him in a chorus of voices. When we headed out around 1 a.m. Lucero were still going strong, with promises to play all the ones they skipped Friday the following night.
One of these days these days will end
As we descended into the depths of the Cumberland Caverns Saturday afternoon, we overheard a pre-teen ask his father, "How long did it take 'em to build this?" Damn. And we thought our generation was doomed. Keep an eye out for that one.
It was shortly before 3 p.m. (way early for The Spin) as we made our way into the Volcano Room, a large chamber dimly lit and musty with cave stank. We quickly spotted a few dozen familiar faces—mostly those of Nashville show-goers and musicians, though Deerhunter's Bradford Cox was also in the mix. We managed to share a few words with William Tyler, who, gleeful over the locale of his final show with the Jews, informed us that their performance was being shot on 16 mm film for a project that will hopefully be released sooner rather than later.
The crowd of roughly 450 hushed to barely a whisper as David Berman took the stage to introduce Kentucky's Arnett Hollow. After musing that a concert in a cave "really puts things in perspective for a minute," Berman cleared the stage to make way for Arnett Hollow's steady, loping brand of newgrass. The five-piece performed a solid set of tightly arranged songs, each containing the requisite amount of swift-fingered Louisville shredding. We grew slightly weary of AH's earnest pickin' and grinnin' toward the end of their set, but we reminded ourselves that Arnett Hollow was bringing the bluegrass, and it was Silver Jews who would be bringing the underground.
The Jews were certainly well-rehearsed, though the boomy and, well, cavernous acoustics made discerning Berman's guttural baritone rather difficult. Longtime Silver Jews and Pavement contributor Bob Nastanovich made a brief appearance, drumming on "Trains Across the Sea," the second tune of the Jews' set. The 15-song performance also featured backing vocals from Bobby Bare Jr. on "I'm Getting Back Into Getting Back Into You," while Cassie Berman's vocals on "Suffering Jukebox" were spot-on and cut like no one else's all afternoon. We were somewhat saddened that we didn't hear "Punks in the Beerlight," but we saw it at Exit/In in November, and we'll admit that "Smith & Jones Forever" was probably the perfect choice to go out on.
Berman admitted at the close of the show that he "never made peace with the encore," and thus, we wouldn't be getting one. "I always wanted to go out on top," Berman said. "But I much prefer this."
Balls
With only 15 minutes to spare before AC/DC, a.k.a. Australia's finest and most testicularly well-endowed rock 'n' roll hall of famers hit the stage, we found our seats in the sold-out Sommet Center and quickly began double fisting stadium-sized cups of Fosters.
The random sample of the crowd in our immediate vicinity included a row of guys with undersized studded Back in Black shirts and oversized cowboy hats, plenty of bottle-blonde cougars who looked as if they just stepped out of a re-shoot of Poison's "Unskinny Bop" video, and a slew of middle-aged men dressed in schoolboy outfits. (It should be noted that most of these men appeared to be lone concert-goers, fueling our speculation that we might soon see any one of them on To Catch a Predator.)
As our senses began to marinate in alcohol, the lights went down and the show began with a cartoon depicting the four band members surrounded by hot chicks, all on a locomotive about to derail. The train subsequently crashed into the screen, splitting it in half, and a prop train—which would later be straddled by a "Whole Lotta Rosie"—burst onstage in a spectacular fireworks display. The band emerged from the wreckage and launched, predictably, into "Rock 'n' Roll Train," the opening track on their latest, Black Ice.
An AC/DC concert is not one in which you need to worry about mid-set acoustic songs, "updated" versions of old classics or obscure B-sides from late '80s albums. It's strict meat and potatoes. "Back in Black," "Highway to Hell," "Dirty Deeds" and especially "Thunderstruck" all killed. The band sounded essential as ever with the 61-year-old Brian Johnson's yowl—cat attacked by coyote—in all its shrieking glory. He and the icon of the Gibson SG, Angus Young—decked out of course in his schoolboy digs—worked the crowd while the legendarily tight rhythm section of elder brother Malcolm Young, bassist Cliff Williams and drummer Phil Rudd anchored the show with the four-on-the-floor bluesy stomp that is the band's primal trademark.
All the traditional clichés of an AC/DC show were in play: the ringing of a giant liberty bell for "Hells Bells," an Angus Young striptease during "The Jack," fire to punctuate the chorus of "TNT" and plenty of Chuck Berry chickenwalking. A platform rose into the air, on which the pint-sized Young did his trademark guitar-solo pinwheels. It was glorious. Almost as glorious as the six deafening cannons that emerged from the back of the stage during the "For Those About to Rock" encore. The performance was about as predictable as it gets, and the crowd response was even more predictable than that, but for great songs, execution, vibes and entertainment, the show was a 10.
For complete Spinnage and links to more photos, visit our "music" blog, Nashville Cream, conveniently located at nashvillecream.com. Otherwise, make sure your CAPS LOCK IS IN THE UPRIGHT AND LOCKED POSITION and send another tirade to thespin@nashvillescene.com.
