Sábado 25 Jul 2009, 16:30
Thu 23 Jul – Joseph Arthur & the Lonely Astronauts
http://i308.photobucket.com/albums/kk340/miss_drivel/joarthur.jpg
Joseph Arthur is one of the artists (e.g. Ed Harcourt, Mark Lanegan, Carina Round, Jeff Klein, Intramural and, in a way, Tiny Echoes) I've got Greg Dulli to thank for. I had no idea he existed until 2006 when he appeared on The Twilight Singers fourth album "Powder Burns." I never looked back since then - I managed (not without problems) to buy all his albums and fall in love with most of them. But even though he is one of my favourite musicians now and I had seen him live before, I was a bit worried because this time he brought The Lonely Astronauts with him and I'm not their biggest fan. I think there's a huge difference in quality between music Joseph recorded with and without his band. Anyway, the show began with a solo Jo set and the audience sitting quietly in chairs or on the floor. We got to hear a couple of older songs including a beautiful version of A Smile That Explodes. Then the Astronauts joined him and together they played some new stuff plus crowd's favourite "In The Sun" (which by the way I despise more and more every time I hear it). The band seemed to be in a very good mood and you could tell they enjoyed the evening just as much as we did. They came back for three encores - two on stage and another one at the merchandise stand after the show. It's really hard to describe what actually happened at the stand, it was the weirdest thing I've ever seen - Jo sang and played the guitar with us singing and clapping along. Later he managed to shake just about everybody's hand and pose for hundreds of photos, posters and CDs were passed among band members to be signed and I even met a Dulli fan there who was wearing a lovely Twilight Singers t-shirt and had a black swan tattooed on his arm :) I also talked to mr Greg Wieczorek, the Astronauts drummer, who played on a couple of Dulli albums, which was a pleasure. Nobody wanted to go home and, although it wasn't the best show I've ever seen, it definitely was an unforgettable night. One of the reasons why I love less popular artists, nothing like that could ever happen after a Coldplay gig…
Setlist (via lonelyastronauts.com):
—Solo
01 - Leave Us Alone
02 - A Smile That Explodes
03 - Echo Park
04 - Vacancy
05 - All The Old Heroes
— Band
06 - Spacemen
07 - Even When Yer Blue
08 - Too Much To Hide
09 - In The Sun
10 - When I Was Running Out Of Time
11 - She Says You Lack Imagination
12 - Missy Baba
13 - Famous Friends Along The Coast
— Solo
14 - Honey And The Moon
15 - Nuclear Daydream
16 - Speed Of Light
— Band
17 - I Donated Myself To The Mexican Army
18 - Iran
19 - You Are Free
— Solo (but band clapping along)
20 - Slide Away (merch stand)
21 - Black Lexus (merch stand)