Wow… It’s been a busy few days, and I have quite a bit that I would like to process, so I’ll try to get through everything in a few different posts, and hopefully we’ll get things caught back up in my life!
First off…
Dave Matthews Night #3
What an amazing end to a wonderful weekend. Bethany and I went up on Sunday night for #3 and decided to once again skip the tailgating. I think we were both a bit tired from being away all weekend long, not to mention a bit saddened by the Broncos loss earlier in the day (don’t get me started). We ended up in the upper lots again, not far from where we were for night #2. We just pulled to the side of the road, set up the chairs, blasted the music and had a good time before the show. We made our way up to the our seats and got to see my good friend Joel, who was helping collect donated food from concert-goers. Then we made it up our way.
Red Rocks Setlist:
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| Don’t Burn The Pig You Never Know Stand Up Grey Street When The World Ends * Dream Girl Lie In Our Graves Lover Lay Down What You Are * Out Of My Hands #41 * Granny |
Halloween * Butterfly Crush * Pantala Naga Pampa Rapunzel * Encore: I Did It [tease] Louisiana Bayou * The Star Spangled Banner [Intro] All Along The Watchtower Special Guests: |
As hyped up as I was to see John Butler Trio for a second night, I was disappointed when the set list was virtually identical to Saturday night’s show. I was hoping to hear some of their other material, but guess I’m relegated to my CD’s.
Highlights of the show:
- They played a lot more obscure songs, as compared to Saturday night (when they played some more mainstream stuff & singles) overall
- They played “Don’t Burn the Pig!” or “Pig” from the album!! Oh man, I don’t think I’ve heard that song live yet. It’s my second favorite DMB song of all-time!
- Great rendition of #41!
- During the show they were trudging along through the set list, when the crowd starting chanting “HAL-LO-WEEN, HAL-LO-WEEN!” over and over again. The chanting got so loud that it seemed like virtually the entire amphitheater to join in, when they responded by playing the darkest Dave Matthews song of all time! It was the first time that I’ve ever heard that live, and was so excited that they played it.
- What’s weird is that the set list says they played 4 encore songs, but in reality it was two. The “I Did It [tease]” was just a few chords, and then the “Star Spangled Banner” was just a bass solo before Watchtower. Pretty sweet though…
Dave Matthews Night #4
Oh man… Those seats were nuts! Below I have posted some pictures to give you a sense of just how close I was. At one point I was standing 20 feet from Dave Matthews! How cool is that?
Red Rocks Setlist:
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| Recently * Drive In Drive Out Typical Situation Everyday Everybody Wake Up Old Dirt Hill Hunger For The Great Light American Baby Intro Dream Girl |
Jimi Thing * Exodus *+~ Louisiana Bayou *+Ä Encore: Smooth Rider * Too Much * Special Guests: |
The show was pretty sweet – not the best show that I had been to all weekend, but there were some big highlights overall:
- They pretty much hit the “reset” button on their set list chooser. Where in the first three nights, they only had a small handful of songs they played twice, Monday night’s set list took no consideration of what was previously done, so it was nice
- “Exodus” – they brought everyone & their mom onto the stage to play this Bob Marley song. I had never heard them play this song before (except in a really old, crappy bootleg version on my computer). It was sweet! They jammed for almost 20 minutes!
- Typical Situation, a classic song that I’ve rarely heard.
- How much fun they had. Dave had some really awesome impromptu moments, at one point singing about how much it sucks to follow up people in his band when they do great solos and leave so much to be expected. It was funny!
- Throughout the course of the show Dave kept thanking the crowd, telling them how cool it was to “end such a great tour on a high note”, which as the show progressed, kept becoming a greater compliment each time. It started off as “ending one of our best tours”, to “our best tour ever”, to “one of the great summers ever” to “the greatest summer of my life” at the end. That was pretty cool! You could that they still enjoying being on the stage together night in & night out, and despite touring for four months straight, that they were really going to miss each other as they’re taking time off this fall & winter.
The parking sucked. Even though my sister and I parked in the same place that I used for night #3, we didn’t leave early enough, and had to be herded out with the rest of the crowd. By the time we got to our cars it took us a good half-hour to get ourselves out of there! Every other night took about 10 minutes and was easy! Oh well, I guess I have to pay for it some time.
So my amazing weekend came to an end – 4 back-to-back Dave Matthews Band shows in (arguably) the greatest venue in the country – I think this may go down as one of those “once in a life-time” opportunities – heck, maybe one of the best weekends of my life!
The next day I was asked multiple times if I was glad for it to be over, or if I was “sick of Dave”. At first my answer was “of course not!”, but after thinking about it, I managed to better articulate my feelings: If I didn’t have any responsibilities or had to make as many sacrifices to go to those shows, I would be happy to go to another week of those shows, but because I pretty much put all of my life & responsibilities on hold for four days – and how much I’m paying for it now – there is a part of me that’s glad that it’s over. Does that makes sense?
Pictures below:
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p align=”center”>See the rest of the pictures on Shutterfly…