The Bitter End
The Bitter End
08 Playing Wheel Crazy Fingers Goin Down the Road Saturday Night.mp3
The March 9, 2022 residency at the Bitter End started to show some momentum of Deadstein and some fans were beginning to show. For the evening's music we chose to first play tribute to the Madison Square Garden show from 3/9/81, this date, 41 years ago just up the road. It was a great show and provided some A-list material for us to play to the crowd. We selected a few songs from that show then continued on to a setlist comprised of some predetermined songs as well as audience requests.
The audience was into us this night. The entire back wall of the Bitter End was dancing by the time we broke into Goin' Down the Road Feeling Bad. We were rocking and the place was into us. It's didn't start that easily. I was feeling good up to about 45 minutes before showtime, when we were scheduled to perform a couple of soundchecks. Due to an unusually loading of McDonalds before the show, at about 6:15, nature was calling me into one of the disgusting Bitter End bathrooms. I was stuck there, sweating bullets, emptying my insides for 30 minutes and many flushes just join the band for the closing of the soundcheck with beads of sweat dripping from my head and soaking into my shirt. The worst of it was over with 15 minutes till showtime but it was a difficult start to the night.
That was pretty much the end of the difficulties and we opened the show with one of our best numbers, Feel Like a Stranger. This got me feeling good and got Deadstein off to a great gig. Rennie forgot the 3rd verse of Althea and pretty much steered us off a cliff, but some how we floated above the ground and never really crashed into the ground. El Paso was mellow and tight, about and much as you could expect from and El Paso from Deadstein. Birdsong follwed, and it was in the middle, Not too hot, but not bad either, it had some nice grooves and swings and was more easy going rather than harsh. The same could be said of the Mingleweood blues as that was raucous from the get-go. The ultra-fast China Cat Sunflower, I know you Rider was worked on the previous week, and concerns over it being too slow, jet propelled the Bitter End China Cat into warp speed. "Gonna Miss Me When I'm Gone" was the end of the Madison Square Garden tribute portion of the night
The rest of the night was dedicated mostly to songs selected by audience members who wrote them down on a piece of paper from which I selected songs to going into each other. It was all going to have to wait for an episode of "Let Scott Sing" as he provided of fans a version of a Box of Rain, artfully sung by Scott, with Rennie in the background.
Playing --> The Wheel started our big second set medley for the night. The playing seemed a bit weak and disconnected but the Wheel transition of of the playing was terrific. Out of the wheel we went to a mollusk filled Crazy Fingers filled with clams from the left and right. We broke out of the lethargy of the Crazy Fingers with a Going Down the Road, This provided nice contrast to the slow Crazy Fingers and people were really into it, dancing up a storm. We rushed into the Saturday Night to bring this portion of the night to a close. Touch of Grey, dedicated to Warren Alstadt, for is ultra-Grey hair, way beyond a touch was pretty good, fast like many numbers, but got people moving. It was cool that there were several Albany alumni there watch us, as well as a bunch of my Brothers friends in town for this 60th birthday over the next weekend. I selected Deal off the request list to close out the night, with one final rockers, before the bar would empty itself out for MuleDog who followed us yet had no one in the audience.
Freak Out!