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E49: Live at Town Hall (Part 1)
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August and Everything After: Live at Town Hall was released August 2011 and recorded in 2007. Join the Crew (Eric, Chris, Geoff, Irish Sean, and Steve from the UK) go over the history of the album, recording fun facts, and talk about the first four songs (including the Round Here/Raining in Baltimore combo!).
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Transcript
Revisiting Counting Crows' Iconic Album
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to Sullivan Street, the town hall episode where, Chris, we get a chance to revisit August and everything after. It keeps coming back, right? It was our like basically our original themed episode.
00:00:15
Speaker
Then we talked about it with the Across the Wire, right? and And here we are. With the the the famous, I guess, town hall lives where they played the entire thing back to back. um Yeah, so it it'll be fun. And we have some. ah It's going to be fun. i got to revisit my 19 years younger self.
00:00:34
Speaker
um And the dot of myself that I could see looked pleased.
Chris's Journey to Hosting a Podcast
00:00:39
Speaker
Yes. Spoiler alert. I can see anything. Spoiler alert. Super fan Chris Miggs might have happened to be there. So and that's he was so into the crows. He decided to host a podcast decades later. It took me a while to come up with the idea, though. I needed to find the right host, you know, 15 years later.
00:00:56
Speaker
um So, yeah, and then Jeff, who Jeff Harkness, who regular guest, what do we call you? Almost like I don't I don't even we got to come up with some kind of ah like permanent house guest who overstayed his welcome. Yeah, and I love it. And you did not get to because we didn't know you then you didn't join the August ah episode two and three. So you've given your thoughts about a lot of these songs before, but in case there's something you haven't said, maybe about, I don't know, Omaha or something, this is your chance to do it, especially the live
International Fans Share Their Passion
00:01:29
Speaker
version. I can't wait.
00:01:30
Speaker
And we do have a today ah two regular listeners from across the pond. Am I allowed to say that? um we From the UK and, well, Spain via Ireland, I guess. So ah first I'll say hi to Sean. Sean, welcome to the podcast.
00:01:47
Speaker
Thanks so much for having me on, guys. Delighted to be here. I know it's um a long time coming, so delighted to be here. Thanks for having me. Yeah, and I think you wrote me pretty early in the podcast, maybe after episode like five or something like that. I've been in there since the beginning, yeah, just as ah ah in ah in a listening capacity. But yeah, delighted to be here. yeahp There's nothing better on Sunday evening than chatting through some some Crow's history. And then we'll go back to you in a second, but I also want to say a hi to ah Steve from the UK. Steve, thanks for joining us.
00:02:16
Speaker
Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having me. Really excited about this. Yeah, and and very similar to Sean, I think I emailed you guys episode four or five or something like that saying, yeah, I want to be on this. This is great, really interesting. And I've been listening ever since. And I think when you started getting the celebrities on, like the ex-band members and things, I was like, oh, I've got no chance now. But yeah, yeah, I'm here. So... No, I i dug back in. Sometimes you just got to find a a good theme in it um or time that you can bring people on. And of course, everybody has opinions about August who listens to our podcast.
00:02:50
Speaker
We also have the World Cup's about to start, right? So have an international theme maybe going on as well. I was actually, jokes aside, I was actually going to bring someone in from East Asia and, well, I guess Southeast Asia. And then, but I was like, yeah, it's too many time zones to, they'd have to record at three in the morning or something like that. So maybe even later earlier. So, okay. I'm not happy about the World Cup. It's all the games. It's too late at night for me. Oh, right. Yeah. No, I've heard about that. That's true. Especially for all the diehard fans in Europe. So let's go back to Sean. So Sean, just real quick, when, like, what's your, and actually you're relatively young. You don't have to say your age, but you're, you're kind of second youngish, you know, listener who's joined us on the podcast. Yeah. How did you get into the Crows? How did you become a super fan?
00:03:42
Speaker
So firstly, I think the album August in itself has quite a weird kind of connection with myself because I think if I'm correct, it was released around September
Personal Connections and Cultural Significance
00:03:53
Speaker
14th of 93. And born September 22nd of 93.
00:03:57
Speaker
So it has about eight days on me and as far as a record. So for me, it's something that I keep going back to as far as a yardstick, you know, of the culture, like when I was born, what the world looked like, how pop music sounded, to what bands sounded like, how bands are dressing, you know, you know, live performances and all that. So it gives me a great glimpse into the, into the, the time where I was born and, um, I kind of age along alongside it. So it's, it's a cool, it's a cool little way, uh, a relationship with, with the album.
00:04:29
Speaker
Um, but I suppose, For me, i come from probably the Shrek generation. and I know you guys have talked about this before. yeah But I suppose 2004, I would have been about 11.
00:04:41
Speaker
So it was kind of an elementary school level. And I had a great teacher back then. A real like ahead of his time kind of teacher. and Mr. O'Byrne was his name.
00:04:53
Speaker
And he used to basically give us these tracks that he loved at the time and would get us to kind of deconstruct them lyrically and thematically and musically and stuff. And we're sitting there and, and, and then I can remember the first time I have two musical memories in my whole life. And one of them was this sitting in class. And I heard the first symbol to that drum loop for big yellow taxi.
00:05:17
Speaker
And that'd come out in 2002 and this 2004. this thousand And, four So I was like blown away by it. The first thing that hit me was kind of Adam's vocal. And like obviously I didn't know it was a ah cover at the time, but um that was kind of my first introduction. And then you kind of go looking for the album that this song is on. And as we both know, we all know that wasn't, didn't show up in an actual track list. It was, I believe, a a hidden track.
00:05:45
Speaker
So I wasn't um investing pocket money in an album for a band that I didn't see the the main single in, you know what i mean? So I skipped that big time. But 2004, same year, was when Shrek 2 came out.
00:05:57
Speaker
And then I hear this voice again in the in the opening credits, basically, and said, I i know this guy, you know? And so that kind of was the second nail in the coffin, I suppose, that got me hooked. Yeah.
00:06:13
Speaker
And from there, it was kind of like, you know, we would we would burn CDs and and I became all that kind of way of sharing music and stuff like that. So, yeah, really, really early. but um And it's kind of just followed me throughout my life and and different kind of, you kind of grow to to have a relationship with different parts of the catalogue as you grow older and different parts of your life and stuff. So really all started there for me. Yeah. Oh, that's great. Jeff, what this goes to show you is that some of, you know, some of these sometimes maligned songs can have real power. i'll get people to you know dig into the catalog, right? And Shrek 5 is coming out next year, so I reckon Adam should write a song for that and get a new generation you know into the crows. They've at least started playing Accidentally in Love Again. so I know. maybe that's an indication they were thinking on the brain. Do you think that influenced, Sean, the songs that come... like
00:07:08
Speaker
Having those be some of the first songs you listen to, did that sort of influence sort of like your path through the catalog? Does that change? 100%. Yeah, 100%. Especially when you you hear like, like, it was a massive, it was a blockbuster movie. And it was a lot of my generation's first time hearing that song was a lot of my generation's first time hearing Hallelujah, because that was covered in that and that soundtrack as well. So these songs are introduced to a whole new generation through, you know, through that, through that medium. and So, yeah, it's, if I'm a band, it's it's the best way to get in front of an audience, you know what I new audience.
00:07:45
Speaker
So, yeah, I think it's ah worked a charm. Chris, there's a little bit of me that thinks that, do you remember that Adam said two years ago that Zoe was trying to get him to bring a new song or an old song back? Now I'm thinking it might have been accidentally a love. Possibly. It's possible. He's pretty open about that, though. I feel like he'd tell the story if that was the maybe. Well, that's true. That's true. I feel like he would tell, he would.
00:08:07
Speaker
you know he would have mentioned that. Yeah, and that's true. I do know that there a lot of the hardcore maybe don't love it. And it's kind of maybe one of their slightly cheesier ones. But, you know, i'm I've left my cool at the door when I enter my my music taste in many ways. So I'm an open lover of of Accidentally in Love.
00:08:26
Speaker
Oh, it's a it's a I think it's a great pop song. yeah i I even at the time said, like, crows can do no wrong. They even do pop songs right, you know, when I heard that. but I actually suspect that one of the reasons they don't play it a lot is that it's it's a lot of words. Yes. Oh, yeah. you know like I think it was was it two summers ago. Was it maybe
Discovering Counting Crows and Musical Evolution
00:08:43
Speaker
24? One of the two last couple of years, they tried to start playing it more, and you could literally kind of hear Adam kind of go, oh, man, no, no, not not quite. like With the words in front of them but still, it's just like in terms of keeping that pacing. oh yeah It seems like they've worked on it because it sounded great when they played it at Stagecoach. Yes. um And that was streamed. But so maybe they've that's the one they put the work into over the last like month or so in sound checks and stuff. You know, that could be true. ah Steve, what about you? How did you get into the car? How did you become like a crow super fan? And I guess you can also, if it's not the same, talk about your introduction to August.
00:09:16
Speaker
Yeah, and well look, at I'm a little bit older, so I am of the time. um So it would have been, so my musical journey was, um I was into that embarrassing soft rock genre. Yeah, I love Bon Jovi and Journey and things like that.
00:09:32
Speaker
And then when i left high school and it was my brother went to college and he was like, you need to stop listening to this now. It's too it's not cool. um And of course, this was 95 or 96. So we had the emergence of what we call Britpop, which is Oasis.
00:09:47
Speaker
And everything that kind of ran with that. and And I went down that rabbit hole and my me and my brother used to play guitars in bands and things. My second favorite band ever behind Crows is Radiohead. I loved stuff like that. and But i still had this yearning for those ballady type things songs, um, from my Bon Jovi days and all of that.
00:10:08
Speaker
And my brother went off to university and one of his friends made him a mixtape, you know, literally literally a tape and, uh, Sullivan Street was on that mixtape. And I was like, oh, wow. And at the same time,
00:10:20
Speaker
and either MTV or it might have been VH1. We had VH1 in the UK. And I kept started bumping into Long December because the first two records were out. and And again, that ballady, piano-y type song, that's the ones I'm drawn to most. I was just like, this band is amazing. So I got both CDs, the first two, I got them together so because they were both out.
00:10:43
Speaker
And it wasn't long after, someone correct me on the date, but ah it feels like it was only just after that that Across the Wire came out. and So I started to experience what they would sound like live and the way they played around with with the lyrics and things like that. And and I was just hooked after that, ah from that point on.
00:11:02
Speaker
So yeah, absolutely adore them. they've been They've been the soundtrack to my life. I'm a lyrics guy. um i love I love the lyrics. I've got some lyrics tattooed on me, which we'll maybe come onto because it's from one of the songs that we're going to cover today. So I'll save that one. I've also got, you know, the shooting star off Satellite. I've got that tattooed on me well. Yeah, that's kind of their unofficial, official signal, a symbol, sorry. Oh, it's on your T-shirt there. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I know that a lot of...
00:11:30
Speaker
they're you're not the only one with that tattoo. Really? Oh, yeah. I've seen it like on Reddit and stuff. And even years ago, when I like flirted with the idea of a couple of tattoos, if I got one Crows-related, was probably going to do the shooting star. So um I did not. But that's cool. Great. Yeah. So so and then my musical taste has gone along a journey, but they've just stayed a constant. And I mean, guys, what how lucky are we that we've we've fallen in love with this band that are still...
00:11:59
Speaker
ah churning out good quality music. We still get to see them live. We still get to see new new music come out from them, you know, just as good as as it used to be. So and couldn't couldn't but couldn't back to better band, really, when you think about it.
00:12:14
Speaker
Yeah. How many bands from that era have ah almost all of their original members as part of them at this point? It's pretty it's a pretty small group that's that... you know, connected and
Band's Longevity and Continued Success
00:12:27
Speaker
stuff. Yeah, and still playing new music as well, you know, and and coming out with new original stuff rather than, you know, there's lots of bands still doing the circuit. And, you know, I went to see Oasis last year, which was amazing, you know, and I took my oldest son, who now loves them,
00:12:42
Speaker
um but that's just they're just playing the hits aren't they they're not bringing anything new out um yeah but they also had to play the show in 15 years i mean i mean yeah it wasn't i went to those shows i went to a couple of those shows too that was not the time for a new song that was not i hope they make some new songs in the future but that was not was that was the time for all of us yelling songs from 30 years ago absolutely absolutely Yeah, I was noticing that the lineup that did the town hall show is the same lineup that is out there today. You know, like even though this show is almost 20 years ago. And usually, you know, the you lose somebody along the way. And obviously they've changed members a couple of times. But it is amazing how long the band has been together and how many of the key members are original, you know, sort of founding members of the band. Oh, I do that. I look at some old, I'm sorry, some old some other bands and then like, oh, they've had seven bassists in 20 years or whatever. It's not even the same band anymore, is it? Yeah.
00:13:43
Speaker
yeah yeah And by by the way, my we went to watch them in Manchester and my brother, who's really into music, he used to write all the songs for our our band. He said that was the best he'd heard them. He reckoned that Manchester show was the best he'd heard them. So to so to be saying that so late in their career,
00:13:59
Speaker
um you know, he said he's just fantastic. Cool. Well, thank you, Steve. Then let's let's go right, I guess, into Town Hall. We'll get into the actual album. So it was recorded in New York City at Town Hall. You'll have to talk a little bit about that, Chris, since you were there. um and so we were just talking about this in the in the in the in the pre-show or whatever. September eighteenth 2007, which as Chris said, would be a weird anniversary because what August was released, released September 14th, 14 years prior. So they were off by four days and unless 14 is ah an amazing ah year to do it. um And then as Steve said in the pre-show, they didn't release the album for another four years, almost exactly four years. It was in August ah of 2011.
00:14:48
Speaker
twenty eleven So you're right. this is um We're almost at the 15th anniversary of the release of Town Hall. um So I guess it was somewhat famous also for being their first official
Memories of the Town Hall Show
00:14:59
Speaker
video release. I think I have that right, Chris. um And I have other comments, but I am going to... um go to oh i did want to say that it when it was released it it was in the top it did make the top 100 so even though a 15 year old live or you know a live album from something 15 years old um you know it's sold it's sold pretty darn well people people loved august and uh yeah we can talk about the video a bit in your experience i will just give one observation now which is that
00:15:32
Speaker
Unlike now when everybody has their cell phones out. No, you know, nobody did. And then one guy had his digital camera out. He wanted to either take one photo or maybe he could record a 10 second video or something of very low quality. But Chris, please talk about your recording. Sorry, recording it your listening and attendance experience at this amazing show.
00:15:53
Speaker
Yeah, so i know and and I think at that time, I don't think I had a camera, a phone that could that was a camera, even a bad one. I think the i think the first camera phone camera I got was the next year. So yeah i could not take anything. i don't have I don't have any photos of the show. um So I went back digging sort of digging into the archives here. The show was announced two weeks before um it happened. This was sort of, it is kind it was a one-off, but they had been touring all summer, and that was part of it. They'd been um come back.
00:16:23
Speaker
doing a ballpark, a minor league ballpark tour with live and collective soul all summer. And I think the big thing that happened that summer from everyone's perspective as, as fans was that, well, first Adam looked completely different than he had the last time we'd seen him. This is, if you go back to the shots in 2006, that's Adam when he he talks about how badly he was doing with, Dissociative Disorder and things like that. That was his biggest and his just he just looked off. right It just was not him. and He came back in 2007 and he is what you see in the DVD. He was significantly trimmer. He'd gone from the sort of the more vertical dreads of the mid-aughts back to the The dreads that look more like he did um in the ah the ninety s in that regard. um But he just looked he was wearing shoes on stage again.
00:17:10
Speaker
and i I mean, this is a serious thing that he'd been performing barefoot for several years. And he he put some jeans and some boots on. He looked like ready to go and and kick ass. um And that summer was a really good tour. those I went to a couple of the ballpark shows and they were great. They were playing a lot of the new songs, which we'll talk ah a little bit more about, that would become on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings. But they were also diving into the catalog in a way they hadn't done in a while. They were playing Have You Seen Me Lately and Perfect Blue Buildings and Time and Time Again and a a lot of different things. Another Horse Dreamers Blues. um
00:17:41
Speaker
Things that they had not played in... a while and the set lists were changing for the first time in a while. So it was a really exciting time. um I went to so i went two shows that summer. I went to one in Maryland visiting some friends in D.C. um with I was supposed to go with a friend of mine who would end up going to town hall with me, but she had to bail and someone else came with me. And I went to one in New York. I had tickets to another one in Lakewood, New Jersey.
00:18:07
Speaker
And this is one of those times, right? This is again, it's 2007. So I bought the ticket. And at that time, I was like, if they're anywhere near me, I'm going to go. Right. And what happened was, I did not properly research how far...
00:18:22
Speaker
the fuck late with Lakewood, New Jersey is from New York and how difficult it is to get there. So like a couple of days before, as I started to sort of plot out, like, okay, cause I was, I'd finished up the work I was doing for the summer. So I had time, right. But I was trying to figure out like, how am I even going to get there and get back? And I could not, I was like trying to get a friend to go and like drive. And I could not figure that out. And there was like, not even really like, there was definitely not a train and definitely not even really but And I was just, eventually I just gave up and I just like, this sucks, but I think I got to call this one.
00:18:56
Speaker
And next morning I woke up and I opened up the Counting Crows message board as I was loathed to do as likely to do at the time. And what I was loath to see was that they had played August straight through at this show that I had a ticket for and hadn't gone to.
00:19:11
Speaker
um So that was a ah fairly distressing morning for me. I was pretty pissed off at myself. um and so But I was like, oh, this is what it is. But they played
Surprise Full Album Performance at Lakewood
00:19:20
Speaker
August. out of Out of nowhere, they just decided we want to play August. We're going to play the whole thing.
00:19:26
Speaker
um And so that was disappointing. but A few weeks later, right they announced the show at Town Hall, um which is right in Midtown Manhattan. um It's like 42nd or 43rd, 6th and 7th. It's very easy to get to. and I was like, I'm not missing this one. um I went back in my emails. There was a fan club presale. So this was the time period when there was a paid fan club. And so as a legacy member, as they called it in the email, we had the first crack at tickets. So i had i was able to get tickets. I went with my friend Maggie,
00:19:55
Speaker
who ah was big Crows fan. We'd seen, we saw that Hershey show together that we, I think we've talked about in the past on this show. um But so she came up from DC and saw the show with me. Shout out Maggie, if you're listening, her favorite song is black and blue or was black blue.
00:20:12
Speaker
Um, But so we went to that show and one of the other interesting things, by the way, tickets, uh, expensive. They were like $75 before a fees. So not, you know, not super cheap. So sometimes we think like, oh man, ah the ticket prices have just shot through the roof, but so, you It was not inexpensive, but town hall is not a big place. it's like two, three thousand people. So pretty intimate place. um We had tickets um on the right, that the sort of the Bryson side of the um of the floor. Row H. Again, if I found the email, so I know row H seats two and four. So when they cut to a very wide shot of the crowd, we're sort of.
00:20:55
Speaker
very far in the sides. You can sort of be like, I can sort of be like, I think that's me over there, but it's never a close up enough to to know that. um And the big thing to remember, so this was in the, the show was to celebrate that they were releasing the deluxe edition of August and everything after on Geffen, the one with the bonus tracks and stuff like that, but they had not announced. So we obviously now know that in the show, they play all of August everything after that was not announced in advance that that was going to happen.
00:21:21
Speaker
And so You know, they open with Round Here into Raining in Baltimore. and Oh, that's pretty cool. And they play Omaha second. You're like, oh, okay, two August songs. No, but that's not that surprising. And neither Round Here nor Omaha are, you know, it'd be not wild. And they play Mr. Jones third. And we're like...
00:21:39
Speaker
okay, this is, this might be the whole record. And then I think it's actually between there that Adam says, you know, he's talking to says this record and you're like, oh a hundred percent. We're getting the whole thing. um which was very exciting and a wonderful makeup for what I had accidentally missed, um, a couple weeks before that. Um,
00:21:59
Speaker
And it's a... I mean, it's a great... But again, it's one-off show. It's interesting. There's no tour after this, right? They played, I think, maybe one more show that year at, like, CMJ or something. But, like, they really didn't... This is the end, which I think helps, right? Because they don't have a next night.
00:22:16
Speaker
So they play... This is a two and a half... Almost two and a half hour show total in total. um They've got the time. They hadn't... They've been off the road. They'd been... um you know, resting.
00:22:29
Speaker
And so now they were ready to go and they'd practice. There's actually a mention there. We were talking about how the band had changed, but the last change in the band was Miller joining, which is 2006. And Adam talks about how one of the reasons, maybe one of the reasons they practiced it, if they had the idea, was that he hadn't played some of these songs at all.
00:22:46
Speaker
And they hadn't played Electric Rain King and they hadn't done all these things together. so it was a real kind of coming back as well. I don't want to spoil. We'll go talk through the songs, but they did. I think it's a really interesting rendition because the band is kicking ass, but the band is also going back to some of the way they played some of these songs in past times. And so I think this, in a lot of ways, this ends up making a really nice document, not just of that moment, but of sort of the history of...
00:23:12
Speaker
these songs we'll dive way deeper into them, but um yeah, it was, it it was an amazing night in the moment. We knew it was pretty amazing and it's kind of cool that we have this document of it going back, but and this know it might be the best. It might be the best show I've seen of theirs. It's certainly in the conversation still. and After 60s or 70s shows or whatever it's been. They didn't announce that they were going to release it, of course, right? You had no idea it was going to be... He mentioned at some point in the in the comments that they were talking about filming it. So I think they... And there were those things up where they're like, we're filming stuff tonight. So we had a sense that it was going to be used for...
00:23:49
Speaker
something I don't think we knew. i don't think they had a sense, oh, this is going to be a DVD or whatever yet. but you know Yeah, okay. so i ah and and We'll get right into the songs in in a sec. I do want to get Jeff's take, but ah just because it is really interesting, that Lakewood show, which as you said, was like...
00:24:05
Speaker
a couple of weeks before they played, you're right. They played the entire August and then their encore was five songs from Saturday night, Sunday mornings, which is really cool. And then they did holiday in Spain and then yours, which I'm guess you'll get into, or maybe you want to talk about it now that, which I did not know that, um,
00:24:23
Speaker
They did play you know the the entire August and then got off stage like they show in the video, but then they did an encore of also five Saturday Night songs and then four songs basically from Underwater Sunshine.
00:24:36
Speaker
Yeah, what would end up being? it's I mean, it's been a a mix of stuff right that they did with um some guests. Yeah, so it was a fun sort of second encore. ah Yeah. Oh, Angels was on there too. But yeah, you get the idea. Angels on there, yeah. But that's kind of cool. ah Jeff, before we get into the songs, do you have anything to add from a historical perspective?
00:24:54
Speaker
um A few tidbits. So one, the town hall show was held the day of the deluxe reissue release. So it was and to coincide with
Inspiration for a Special Show
00:25:07
Speaker
that.
00:25:07
Speaker
Adam had said that he had been asked a million times to do a show like this where they would play the whole album from start to finish. And he was always of the opinion that it wouldn't really work. He said that the sequencing of the album didn't really fit the sort of arc that you needed to make for a good concert. It didn't have like the highs and lows in the right places and,
00:25:32
Speaker
um It didn't kind of build in the right way. And so he never thought that it would work. The original concept for the town hall show was that it was going to be like a last waltz kind of event where um and that's the movie about the band where they play this concert and all of their friends and peers that they played with over their career join them at one at a time and do a song with them.
00:25:58
Speaker
And they were going to do a show like that where they bring in Chris Carraba and folks like that who were friends and peers and compat compatriots. And they were going to do a show where they played everybody's music and everybody was on and off stage and and things like that.
00:26:12
Speaker
um But ultimately, hes Adam said that when he was going through the material for the deluxe edition, particularly the concert in Paris that ended up on there, he started like listening to...
00:26:29
Speaker
1994 Counting Crows and and sort of revisiting that time. And as they're preparing this deluxe edition and going through the old tracks and going through the live concerts, he said this is one of the reasons they started resurrecting some of these older songs that they hadn't played in a long time, because he was he was kind of revisiting them for that project.
00:26:48
Speaker
um So they get to Lakewood and he Adam's recollection is that he and Emmy are sitting on the bus trying to figure out what the set list is going to be. And Adam can't come up with anything he wants to play. And it's like, no, no, I don't want to do that. I don't want to do that.
00:27:04
Speaker
And he starts to think to himself, maybe we should try this thing where play August from start to finish. And literally they were going to be springing it on Millard who hadn't played electric rain King. And they were going to be springing this on the band completely unannounced, but let's just try it and see what happens, you know, and and do it.
00:27:24
Speaker
Um, i'll I'll read you, since we're kind of geeking out on this, but I'll read you what Adam actually wrote about that. He posted this on social media um about how this could actually work. kennedy as He said that we're playing the songs differently now than we did in the past. And because of the way we play them now, this actually could make a good concert.
00:27:48
Speaker
So here's what Adam writes. He says, with the epic quality of Round Here as we play it now, you could follow it with Omaha and the longer intro and the familiar drumbeat to Anna Begins makes for a much better live transition from Perfect Blue Buildings.
00:28:04
Speaker
By the same token, the cool recognizability of the Time and Time Again intro and Charlie's organ solo are a better transition as well. The key was transitions. Sullivan Street is a longer journey now, and the end is a much bigger climax.
00:28:19
Speaker
Couple that with the fact that Dan's guitar intro to Ghost Train is a much darker, aggressive one than on the record. And that switch between the two sort of down songs, I don't know if he's talking about Sullivan Street or Raining in Baltimore, becomes a much more interesting set of dynamic shifts.
00:28:38
Speaker
Murder, of course, is a freaking great way to end this set. Close quote. close quote um So this was what like prompted Adam in Lakewood to say, let's just try it and see what happens. And so they did it and it went over really well. And he really enjoyed the experience. And they decided, let's do this for Town Hall, but let's not you know work work on this and try it the next night and the next night. Let's just save it.
00:29:08
Speaker
We got our one rehearsal in. And we'll do it again in New York City on the 18th. So that was some of the the history leading up to it. And then also, I suppose we'll talk about this. And that night they did, they did, um the Saturday nights and Sunday morning songs, and then they did a bunch of covers. And I guess, and Chris can talk about this, but Adam said, our plan was to do this kind of bring everybody out on stage for the covers part of the show. So we were going to do the town hall thing with August as kind of our first part, part one. And then part two was going to be bring everybody out on stage. But he said between the deluxe reissue, the new album being done and this town hall event, he felt like this was kind of a good time to celebrate everything that that the Crows had done.
00:29:58
Speaker
um Ultimately, of course, um we only get the the first part of it. It'd be so great to have this whole concert on video, you know, as as good as the part one is. I'd love to have all of the Saturday nights and Sunday morning songs and all the covers and and all that would be really cool to see this whole thing.
00:30:17
Speaker
um So, yeah, that's that's some of the the background to this. And then, of course, the one other thing we'll probably talk about this, ultimately putting together this town hall show at the Deluxe Edition led to the delay of Saturday nights and Sunday mornings at this show. He says it's coming out in November, I think he said.
00:30:36
Speaker
And then obviously it doesn't come out. They delay it and and it comes out the following March. So that was all tied into this. And he talked about that too, like all the preparations that we've had to do to put together two whole albums at once, the deluxe edition of August and then Saturday nights and Sunday mornings. It's like we're having to do liner notes and photos and, you know, this whole process. And it's like, I don't want to,
00:31:00
Speaker
rush through it so we're going to take a little more time on saturday nights and sunday mornings make sure that everything is as it should be so and then this wasn't released till another three years after that anyway so that's kind of funny yeah well i think the deluxe edition of august was a time oh that's true project right right but yeah it's interesting i mean my my theory and it's just a theory is that it had something to do with their contract with geffen ending after saturday nights and sunday mornings And so my guess is that it was somehow proposed to Geffen as something, you know, that they could release and they probably declined to do it. And so we're going to do the deluxe edition of August and on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings. And then that'll be that.
00:31:42
Speaker
Because when it came out, it, didn't come out on Geffen. It came out on Eagle Rock. Oh, yeah. saw the label was Eagle Rock, which I have no idea what that is. They've kind of been known for doing reissues. They do old Stones concerts, and this is their business is to put out these kind of projects.
00:31:57
Speaker
Like concert DVDs. Yeah. My guess is it just had something to do with their transition out of Geffen Records. That's why this didn't get released earlier. And they ah obviously own the rights to it and eventually put it out themselves, which is great.
00:32:13
Speaker
It's interesting, Jeff, because in part that the idea for something that's kind of like The Last Waltz you probably influenced what ends up happening like two years later, which is the Traveling Circus and Medicine show, right? That's probably exactly yeah the idea of the but not being able to really pull it off the way they wanted to, but maybe thinking about it is what got them to that place that he they got to um not that long after this, you know Yeah, obviously they had that idea and were into this idea of having ah you know a group of friends on stage playing everybody's songs. Yeah.
00:32:43
Speaker
Yeah. The interesting thing about what you said, Jeff, about Adam's notes about it is... um He almost does it... right right um And again, um I don't follow and I don't know all the history, but you know occasionally the idea will still come up. like He'll be interviewed by somebody and somehow the thing will come up like, oh, you should play August the whole entirety again, just like you did before once. And he basically is like, no, I have no interest in that.
00:33:12
Speaker
um you know The only one that we would ever do maybe is this desert life just because we like playing it the most. And then he doesn't... yeah Like he seems so much more enthusiastic by the notes that that you said, but maybe he just, and did he ever do it again after these two times that we
Adam Duritz on Performing Full Albums
00:33:26
Speaker
know of? There's one more in 08. There's one more, like a random, one of the random summer shows is an August playthrough. Okay. um That's interesting.
00:33:34
Speaker
Okay. That's it. I understand what he's saying. I also think it would be, I think both are like, I understand what he's saying, but I also think it would be fun. Like I talked to Jeff, I said, I'd love to hear like Saturday night, Sunday mornings being played in entirety. I would pay triple the price to hear that. I just think it's cool. And it takes, you know, as a one-off show.
00:33:51
Speaker
um Okay. So let's go track by track. And um so we'll start with round here, which of course, either you'll love it or get annoyed. that Raining in Baltimore is blended in this song, right? I guess if you're a purist, you might want that, ah you know, later in the track list. But Sean, let's go to you about this this this song.
00:34:13
Speaker
Yeah, and i love it. I love it. I think firstly, I know it's part of the album, but I think it's such a ah power move to start off with around here. I saw them in 2022 in Barcelona and they started off around here as well.
00:34:29
Speaker
And it's a song that would be on so many bands, on course and towards the end and stuff. And it really backs their catalog when they can go, we're coming out and we're starting with it, you know, and obviously look because of the track listing has to be here.
00:34:41
Speaker
I thought with the addition of Raining in Baltimore, it was heavy. You know, I kind of, that what I was thinking of it was like, what ah the the way I could compare it was like getting your main course for your for your for your entree at the start of a meal. You know, you're getting your your very heavy thing early. and And it's, it's, he goes, he goes on his Duritzisms, as I like to call them, where he kind of goes into the song and, and, and explores and stuff like that.
00:35:08
Speaker
And then you get the sordid humor reference as well with private archipelago. and But it's heavy, you know, it's, it's, it's not just around here. It's, it's raining in Baltimore as well, which thematically is quite heavy as well. And then you get kind of his, his parts as well. So love it. It's a great, it's a great intro. and But again, it's it's kind of, I think for me, it's balancing. It needs a the Omaha coming and saving it afterwards, personally, to just bring it up a little bit, bring a bit of levity to the situation. and But again, you can see very early on that the band are in top form. Like they're loose in the in the right ways and so tight in the right ways, which I know sounds strange, but...
00:35:48
Speaker
like the butt Like I watched the the DVD. I'd been listening to it quite a bit in just coming up to this episode. But I watched it two nights ago. And the body language between the band members and the communication, because they'd just come off at a summer touring. So they were tight. And the body language is incredible. The the way they they communicate, and the way they let add they give Adam that space.
00:36:13
Speaker
they're just on top form straight away, you know? So yeah, a little bit heavy, but an amazing way to start a show for sure. Yeah. Thank you. yeah I do think that, um, Adam, um,
00:36:25
Speaker
You know, you know you you know theying they play the same songs all the time, right, for decades, and and and and and sometimes these tours are so long and long. But I get – Adam is one of these performers, and I think the rest of them, that he knows when it's time to shine, like a video recording here, he knows it's going to be a He steps it up even higher, and it's shown here. Steve, what about your take on Around Here, Reigning in Baltimore?
00:36:48
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, i love Round Here. it's that that That opening guitar riff has brought so much joy to my life because when you just hear that little pause and then the riff starts and obviously you know exactly what they're going to do I love when they open with it. I always always do. And they often do, don't they, these days? Or if not, it's an encore. So yeah, absolutely adore that riff. um And I thought it was a great alternative. um I loved the way they went into Raining in Baltimore in the middle.
00:37:18
Speaker
um I found, and and this applies to the whole night, um some people get put off when Adam comes out, steps away from singing the songs and he'll speak some of the lyrics sometimes. And, and you know, if you're trying to sing along, you can't achieve that. We we all know that. We we get that.
00:37:36
Speaker
I think he finds a really nice balance on this night. He sings them all almost like the record and just in the right places, he slows it down and speaks. I made a note about ah one of the Rain in Baltimore lines when he says, I miss you, and he just pauses when he says, I miss you, you know, and and and it really emphasises what he's trying to say there.
00:37:57
Speaker
um I love the bit where he says, Dan, I like to hear a little guitar and hands over to to to the little mini solo there. Yeah. I like that. I think it's a Sordid Humour song with the private archipelago in there. I love that. I hate to look that up. but i I love when he jumps into these other songs. It's amazing.
00:38:16
Speaker
And one of my favourite things ever with a Round Here alt is where they almost pause and drop drop you straight back into Round Here from nowhere. um they've I've seen them done that really dramatically in the past. Not as much on this one, but sometimes they almost stop and jump back into, you know, there's a girl in the parking lot and it's amazing. So yeah, it's up there for me as one of the best, best ones, really good version. I adore around here and and always will. So yeah, I loved it.
00:38:46
Speaker
Jeff, any thoughts?
00:38:49
Speaker
ah Pretty much the same things. i mean, it's a, it's a, it's their signature song, so it makes a lot of sense to open the show with it. And um I do like the sorted humor, um,
00:39:02
Speaker
song that they put in this one and also the um ah last song of the night too. and definitely go listen to those Sorted Humor albums. That was the band that Adam sang backup for them. David Emmerich was a member.
00:39:17
Speaker
um Marty Jones was a member. And they have some really great material. I i love those. I agree. I got into them last year. Yeah, the Sorted Humor songs. They're going on my list. Really, really good. And obviously, Adam's doing them completely differently as as he would, but um really worth listening to, you too.
00:39:39
Speaker
I was going to ask Chris where I thought this was a pretty epic round here. Chris, where would you rank this in terms of round here epicness? oh that's i think this is certainly pretty high on the list. I think reigning in Baltimore in the middle is always pretty great and the private archipelago finishing it.
00:39:57
Speaker
um I'm trying to think through. I mean, this has got to be in the top few I've ever seen, um you know, especially yeah everything that comes with it. there's only like one or two other ones that even sort of like spring to mind immediately. So that would tell me that this is, i mean, it's pretty up there. It's pretty great. It's um they really jump out. Interestingly, they don't play raining in Baltimore here.
00:40:26
Speaker
it was only six months later. They started playing it again. i guess maybe the thought of it, or he figured it out. I don't know, but it does that Bowery ballroom show in 2008. He busts out, you know, raining in Baltimore at the piano.
00:40:39
Speaker
which is kind of oh yeah, you could, you
Raining in Baltimore's Return to Live Shows
00:40:41
Speaker
could have done it. And actually, i because I looked up the next playthrough that they did in some, it's I think Saratoga next, next year, they did play raining in Baltimore by itself. So I guess theoretically, that's the only one with the the whole thing in, in one's in certain senses, but.
00:40:56
Speaker
Adam had said at one point he had been too lazy to learn the piano for that. And that's why they hadn't been playing it as a complete song. Cause he was like, yeah, I've just been too lazy to go learn the piano. So he must've sat down at some point and said, all right, I'm going to figure this out. Yeah. Once they finished the art for Saturday nights and Sunday mornings, he was like, oh I guess I got it. It's like, I can learn that song again.
00:41:18
Speaker
that's fine But can you remind me, ah Chris, was it was assigned seats there, right? It's not. OK, yeah, it's it's not it's not it was not general admission or whatever. So, OK, yeah, um I mean, this is a great version. do.
00:41:32
Speaker
As a purist, I would have liked to hear one song of just him on the piano for for the August. that that That's just me. I understand why he did it, whether it was out of laziness or just he likes fitting it into.
00:41:44
Speaker
When i so I just saw him in Spain, I think they had Raining in Baltimore and around here. So, I mean, it's nice to hear it because i hadn't I've never heard the song otherwise. did I noticed on this show, I guess I'll bring it up now, that they the light um they've the lighting a bit on the current shows, I think. And I think they even had someone do some things. And I noticed that they nowadays, if they have these Bryson beginnings, they focus on him and they did not on this. Like they shined a light on Bryson both on Time and Time Again and all of them, all all of these songs. Yeah.
00:42:16
Speaker
um I will say town hall. I mean, in terms of like the ability to do a full light show, town hall is not a big again. Like i think I think part of it is what they're capable of in like an amphitheater where they have ah like a bigger lighting rig yeah for lack of a better term. So it's similar. um I might note some of these, I don't have any notes except for, is that how they play it now or not? And the only other thing I had here is it's such a minor point is that now they kind of do a very extended Emmy Charlie intro to this song.
00:42:44
Speaker
If you hear it live, almost like, and to me, it's always sounds a little Pink Floyd esque now, the longer version of it. um But this one's a little shorter. Okay. Okay. Let's go then to Omaha, which, um yeah, this is, how how old is this release now? 20 years. And this is kind of the version that they still play with the crowd singing it. So that's all I had on this. So Sean, we'll go to you.
00:43:08
Speaker
Yeah, again, I just loved the transition from from that that, the kind of lift up into a sing song. Basically, it kind of invited the crowd in for the first time. And and it was a really, for me, this this whole performance signaled kind of a point in the band's history where they were kind of, you know, we how we how Adam feels about looking back on things and and playing things the same time way around, e etc.,
00:43:36
Speaker
there seemed to be like him being at peace with playing this, you know, and the way it was and, and, and kind of welcoming the crowd and sharing it with the crowd and almost looking at back with a bit of pride instead of being afraid to play it the same way. So I think it was a, it's, it sounds great. I mean, that, that,
00:43:54
Speaker
that um the accordion on this is incredible like the the adding of the accordion here i know it's on the the recording itself but adding it in as kind of ah a more of a major player on on the track but live i think just opens it up so din much more dynamically and it adds so much to it so yeah not too many notes and just kind of really nice transition into kind of inviting the crowd in for the evening you know right thank you steve any thoughts about omaha Yeah, Omaha for me is lower down the list of, you know, my favourite songs from the album. It's not, it's not you know, it being my bottom three songs, um nothing wrong with it. as and And look, i've I've listened to lots of your podcasts and and you always get people defending their song choices, even when they're lower down the rankings. I love everything they do, but it's not up there. It's it's not my favourite song.
00:44:46
Speaker
That said, this version was fantastic. um A great live version. um I loved, um like Sean says, the the accordion and the the combination of Immy on the mandolin as well. I always loved that combination that when they put them together and they and they did that, it's front centre of it. um it was It was a great live version of it. But yeah, not my favourite song, but yeah, wonderful to see.
00:45:10
Speaker
And I love the crowd participation on this one as well. Yeah, thank you. I said that to um when when I met Emmy, what was that, a year or so ago? I quickly said to him something about that. when my My first memory of watching the Crows was almost like, I i don't know, that that he still did that great mandolin, which if you're not paying attention to...
00:45:34
Speaker
the crows album you almost miss it i think especially as a younger listener and then it's he features it so prominently and it was so good and i was like wow they knew that that part was important and they and they brought that out live because i think that those little things that if regular band would like why do we need the mandolin that's just for the recording we can play it without it um and then emmy you always said like what are you saying that we always play things the same no we play it different i'm like no no i'll forget it it's okay I think Imer has great production instincts. Like he's a producer. He does so much production. So like you can tell that he knows the nuances that are needed to elevate the song life. Like whether it's the steel guitar, we'll see this throughout the songs that we're going into or the mandolin here. He just knows what's needed. And and yeah, he's a massive part of this night, I think.
00:46:22
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, no, I agree. it it Yeah, we'll we'll talk about that. some notes about that. And he know and he loves to play different instruments, etc. Let's go to Jeff. Any thoughts about Omaha? Well, I love how Emmy plays the mandolin like it's a flying V or something. You know, he he actually like really rocks on the mandolin. He's not, you know, he's like got it up in the air and all this kind of stuff. and So it's fun to fun to watch him. And I also thought watching this, like, you know, he's so talented. And what fun it would be to be a multi-instrumentalist and just sort of pluck different instruments off the stage for each song and do something cool on it. You know, he's he's a ah great sort of Swiss Army knife musically for the group. That's why he liked doing that Jimmy and Emmy last year, too, in Europe, because he could play the mandolin the whole time. And and he mentioned that briefly on... the
00:47:14
Speaker
on the the James Campion podcast. By the way, he has a new one if you haven't heard it yet where Chris, forgetting the title, but it's like top 200 albums or something. But anyway. Profund music. Okay. Yeah. So please listen to James Campion's new podcast. ah Yeah. But he had in me on and that was great.
00:47:30
Speaker
um Okay. Jeff, did i cut you off or that was about it? No, but um another, another enthusiastic thumbs up for Adam's opening with the kiss destroyer t-shirt. I thought that was a a nice choice. As we move through the wardrobe changes, that was a a nice opener as well.
00:47:49
Speaker
All right, Chris, anything about Omaha? It's Omaha. It sounded great. Yeah, I agree. Mr. Jones, I don't have many notes. I just say that this is I think it's almost the first song on. I mean, they're all good performances, but this is the first um that I was like, geez, Adam singing performance here is 10 out of 10. I think sometimes he wakes up a little bit or, you know, and also like he doesn't want to. blast out everything the first song and destroy his vocals. But he's in his groove here. And I think there's like four or five songs that, I mean, they're all great, but some of this is like, this is 100% to me for Mr. Jones. Sean, to you.
00:48:25
Speaker
Yeah, very little. and Sounds great. Band are on fire. And all I would say here is that I'm very much... kind of agreeing what Steve said earlier, he gets the balance between, i guess, his singing, his vocals here and the kind of performance art slash front man ism of it really, really well. I think he, he, he toes that line excellently. So, um, yeah, sounds great.
00:48:48
Speaker
Steve. Yeah, i have ah I was going to say I love hate. It's not hate. I love ah not so much love relationship with Miss Jones. like Maybe many of us do. you know It can be overplayed, can't it, from a Crows fan perspective, but it's one of one of the songs that got me into them. It reminds me of me and my friend back in the day, me and my friend Mark, with the way he talks about him. Yeah, it's one of the best it's one of the best live versions I've heard of this. um I've got a note here about the backing vocals being been really good for my band. I think they were on par that night. i'm I'm a bit of a backing vocals guy. I always listen out for them. I love the harmonies.
00:49:28
Speaker
um i Like I said, grew up listening to Richie Sambora doing Bon Jovi backing vocals. He's the king of it. And I love to hear anything like that. And and they were really good. and i always think they could do a little bit more with Counting Crows because they've got, sometimes they'll all be singing um and there's an opportunity, but they yeah they took it with this one.
00:49:46
Speaker
ah Really good vocals on that one. Yep, yeah they're one of the best, I think, with the harmonies. Underrated, I think. Yeah, exactly. I think they're in that top echelon of all bands. and but you're right yeah I think they need to play louder sometimes, you know, in the mix. I think sometimes we could hear... I'd like to hear a little bit more of the other's voices sometimes.
00:50:05
Speaker
um i Maybe that's just me. Jeff, anything about Mr. Jones? Well, it wouldn't be me if I wasn't a contrarian here and there, right? So...
00:50:16
Speaker
The one thing I, one of the notes that I had on this show is I do think in this particular show, there's like too much talk singing from Adam at times. um And he, you know, sometimes he does a lot of this and sometimes he doesn't, but I felt like in this show,
00:50:34
Speaker
um And this was one of the songs I wrote this note on, Mr. Jones. I thought Anna Begins, Round Here. He was doing like too much of the talking of the lyrics. And like here he's saying all of the beautiful colors, you know, and and you're you're just like, dude, just sing it. You know, um not that he has to do it the way that he did it on the record, because obviously,
00:50:57
Speaker
I don't think many like long time counting Crows fans expect that out of the band and they know that Adam changes it. I love their ability to change their material, reinterpret it And, um ah but, but here I felt like he kind of fell into this thing. I was thinking as I was kind of digging into the near history of this event that he was kind of revisiting and finding these songs again and finding his, you know,
00:51:25
Speaker
ability to perform again. And he was so much like more physically together at this point, mentally together. And so in some ways you see this show, i mean, when they're doing some of these songs, they hadn't been, as Chris said, hadn't been doing them for a long time. And so he's kind of rediscovering them.
00:51:43
Speaker
But I think at times um he's doing for me, he's doing too much of the talk singing thing. And Mr. Jones was an example. Now, this is a song that I um even though it's the first song I ever heard from them and it's been played to death, I never get tired of this song.
00:51:59
Speaker
And there are some of those songs I um burn out on. But this is song that no matter when I hear it, I still love it. um If they play it live, I'm always happy to hear them do it. And um it's it's i just sitting it's still one of their great songs after all these years.
00:52:16
Speaker
agree. Chris. It makes me laugh, Jeff. My buddy years ago, my friend Andy came to watch Counting Crows with us. And it was the first and the last time because I don't think he was that impressed. And he kept shouting, stop talk singing because he see he just he just wanted to hear the record. And he was like, why is he talk singing all the time? It's hilarious.
00:52:36
Speaker
Yeah, he did a lot of that. Yeah, yeah. yeah Chris, any final thoughts on Mr. Jones? I like this version. I feel like it, like relative to where they play it now, it's a little bit heavier, a little bit more rocking for lack of a deep musical term. Yeah. um And I do think it's interesting. I think they'd played, i think at this point they'd been playing it acoustic ah quite a bit. They were kind of like wavering, maybe not always playing it that way, but it was interesting. But again, maybe it's somewhere in between, maybe the music kind of heavier, but Adam's delivery a little bit more on the the quieter side in that regards was interesting, but. um
00:53:08
Speaker
No, that's good. let's we I want to save some space here. We got some we got some really deep ones to get into. right. So that's it for part one of the Town Hall episode. Part two will be coming out in just a few weeks. So stay tuned. And thanks for listening to us down here at the Only Counting Crows podcast.
00:53:24
Speaker
Sullivan Street.