Concert Reviews- Brent Fusco in Lawrence Kansas - April 1996

At long last, I have achieved another of my life's goals -- that being that I have borne witness to a live GBV performance (my first). This one was at the famous Bottleneck in Lawrence, Kansas, and in fact it was the first time the band has played there or anywhere else in the general vicinity of Kansas City. Likewise, this was the closest they have ever come to my home port of Fayetteville, Arkansas, which is still a good five-hour drive for me -- but a five-hour drive that I had no compunction about making, nor do I have any regrets after the fact. The show was a musical Mecca for me, of sorts.

I arrived early with my friend Michael (who had never heard of GBV before) in hopes of saying hello to Bob or anyone else. Unfortunately, Bob stayed backstage most of the time, and the only times he came out he seemed to be focused on watching the opening bands, so I didn't want to interrupt him. However, I was able to talk to Mitch Mitchell for a few minutes and found him to be every bit as friendly and forthcoming as everyone else has reported. I introduced myself by telling him that I had bought one of the signed Rafter Tag records that he had auctioned off through Brian's page, and he immediately lit up and said that he was extremely glad to meet me. He shook my hand repeatedly and was so effervescent that Michael later asked me, "Are you famous or something?" It was true -- I really felt like he was somehow as honored to meet me as I was to meet him. Anyway, I told him how happy I was to finally get to see them live and we talked a little about what a good venue the Bottleneck was. Mitch especially liked the size and layout of the place and commented that he felt a lot more comfortable in a place like that than in the larger venues they played on the Urge Overkill tour. Inevitably, the subject of PB and Brian Mikesell's homepage came up, and Mitch expressed a lot of gratitude for all of Brian's work -- a sentiment with which I concurred.

After talking with Mitch for a while, I returned to watching the opening bands, which included a poppy group called What Gives (I think) and another band called V-3. What Gives seemed to have some pretty decent songwriting skills, although their stage presence could use a little work. However, they were great to listen to and did a great cover of Elvis Costello's "A Good Year for the Roses." V-3 didn't impress me as much. For some reason they reminded me of the Jesus Lizard, although I'm not sure I've really heard the Jesus Lizard enough for that to be a valid comparison. In any case, they played some rough-edged, often atonal punk with sometimes amusing lyrics (such as in the song "Son of Sam Donaldson").

By the time GBV came onstage, the house was sold-out packed and extremely receptive. Bob, dressed in black jeans and a black sweatshirt, commented several times throughout the show on how great the crowd was and promised that the band would be returning in the future. The performance itself was every bit as good as I had hoped and included almost every song I could have reasonably hoped they would play. About the only notable MIA was "Marchers in Orange," but I can hardly complain considering the otherwise comprehensive set. I didn't write down a set list, but highlights for me included two of my newest favorites, "Underwater Explosions" and "Your Name Is Wild," which Bob mentioned will be their next single. This was great news for me as "YNIW" was the first song to really leap out at me from the new album, and it's one of the few that I thought had the potential to become a certifiable mainstream hit. What most struck me about the show, however, was how much UBUS approximates their live sound. I haven't heard anyone else on the list mention this before, but every song they played (including the older material) seemed to me to have that driving, in-your-face directness of the songs on UBUS. Does this sound reasonable to anyone else?

If I were to have any complaints about the show, it would be the standard complaint about the lack of Tobin Sprout songs. We did get a couple however, thanks to the fact that Greg Demos broke a bass string, which allowed Tobin the opportunity to fill the interim by singing "Awful Bliss" and then dueting with Bob on "14 Cheerleader Coldfront." I was particularly entertained by Bob's mic-swinging, high-kicking, Budweiser-swigging antics, which worked quite well with Mitch's Who-style windmills and high jumps, not to mention the fact that cigarettes seemed to magically appear in his mouth. I never saw him light a single cigarette, but somehow he was never without one aside from the few times it fell out his mouth while singing. Speaking of which, Mitch handled the lead vocals on "Lethargy," which was a complete surprise to me. Does he always do this? I had always assumed it was Bob singing.

In any case, the band certainly seemed to enjoy the show as they returned for three full sets of encores and didn't finally quit until it seemed that they were all simply too drunk to continue. At the final encore, Bob summarized the evening with, "I think it's safe to say at this point that Lawrence fucking kicks ass." I was immediately prepared to make another five-hour trip the next time they show up.

Before I left, I managed to find Mitch again in the crowd to thank him for the great show and to say goodbye. Amazingly, along with his advanced drunkeness, he was even more friendly and again repeatedly shook my hand and insisted that I keep in touch with him through e-mail. For me, it was the best possible way to end a show by one of the finest bands musical history will ever know.

I didn't notice anyone who seemed to be recording the show, but if anyone out there has a bootleg, PLEASE CONTACT ME!

Rallied,
Brent Fusco
fuscob@tyson.com