| Aimee Mann
Slim's, San Francisco
29 November 1993
with The Michael McDermott Band
Chris and I arrived at Slim's just after 9:00 p.m., and The Michael
McDermott Band were already on stage. I believe it was actually their
first or second song. We found the people we were meeting, and after a
couple of songs, and a can of Guinness Pub Draft, Kathy said to me,
"He's too young to be that boring". I'll have to admit, The Michael
McDermott Band were not very unique. They copped bits of a famous Who
song and another song that I tried very hard to ignore for their bits
of excitement, and he tried oh so very hard to emote. But to no avail.
The crowd were much more interesting than the band. They played about
eight undistinguished numbers and left the stage.
So I went to get another Guinness and then we made our way to the front
of the stage. We were trying to guess on which side Dave Gregory would
be standing, because Kathy, Becky and I were there mostly to see Dave
perform. Chris, on the other hand, actually owns Aimee's album and
really likes it. So we guessed the right hand side, and of course he
came out on the left. We all cheered "Dave!" as he came on stage, I
think he was a little embarrassed by all the noise, especially as he
was merely instrumental backup for the name artist.
But Aimee Mann is quite a respectable performer and songwriter in her
own right. With nary a hesitation they launched right into the first
song and from the first beat to the last the performance was well worth
attending. Ms Mann was wearing something that looked as though it
should have been worn by Adam Ant: a tailored knee-length jacket with
wide cuffs and lapels, cut in a nineteenth century style, complete with
frilly blouse, its cuffs showing from the arms of the jacket. She
looked almost nothing like the picture on the cover of her album.
She started off with "50 Years", and proceeded to play most of the
songs from her new long-player, interspersed with a few songs from what
she called "my previous band, Til Tuesday". Ms Mann played bass on
most of the songs, acoustic guitar on a fair handful, and electric
guitar on a couple of songs. In fact, she looked a little
uncomfortable without an instrument in her hands: the roadie had taken
her electric to replace a broken string and she needed one now, so she
grabbed the nearest one around, which may have been Dave Gregory's, and
played that for the remainder of the song. She looked like she was
conducting when she wasn't playing guitar; her hands made motions in
the air to the pulse of the music.
As it turns out, the band was entirely different from the cast of her
album except for the drummer who played on one track. Her backup band
consisted of, from left to right, Brian Stevens on twelve-string guitar
and doubling on bass and backup vocals, Dave Gregory on electric guitar
doubling on keyboard, Milt Sutton on drums and backup vocals, and a
very proficient and friendly guitarist, Clayton Scoble, who also sang.
(Thanks to Jeff Williams for providing all the names.) The guitarist
also provided one of the high points of the concert: Ms Mann was
singing a ballad, playing acoustic guitar, with low-key keyboard, bass
and tambourine accompaniment, and the guitarist provided a lovely solo
on a battery powered ancient Casio two-octave keyboard. It was a
perfect moment. The crowd went wild. He also provided the main body
of guitar solos, doing an excellent job, playing some slide solos, some
wah-wah, some both, some neither.
Ms Mann did not have much to say between songs. At one point she said
"This is the new single off my new album. There. I said it", and with
no further ado proceeded to play said song. At another point she said
something about not knowing what the band were doing behind her; they
were exchanging guitars because of broken strings. Late in the set she
introduced the band. She also admitted that she had washed her clothes
before this gig, thinking it would be a nice thing to do. So she was
wearing clean clothes. At another point she wondered why the audience
were so quiet, but then decided that we would probably yell out "Whoo"!
After all, said she, "I saw a band here last night and I said whoo!"
From that point on everybody in the audience would yell "whoo!"
whenever they were enjoying the show. There were a lot of "whoo"s
yelled last night. "Hurt You Now" was introduced as a song about
revenge, and it was a powerful electric number, Dave Gregory provided
lead guitar punctuation in a middle-eastern mode. The overall sound
reminded me of Matthew Sweet at times, very electric and powerful,
almost grungy, but with lots of pure pop overtones.
After a respectable set, perhaps eight or ten songs, they retired from
the stage to many cheers and much applause, coming back for three
encores due to overwhelming crowd response. One of the songs played
during the first (or was it the second?) encore was Til Tuesday's hit
song "Voices Carry", which she introduced as having a "video which
inspired many bad hairdos". I noticed that there was a riff, played by
Mr Gregory, which sounded like a Kinks song I couldn't quite put my
finger on, so I said to Kathy, "Isn't that a Kinks song?" and sure
enough, they ended with the main riff to "She Really Got Me". The
crowd went wild. Ms Mann also introduced a song as being written for
Scott Miller, of Loud Family, and following that song, invited Scott up
to the stage to play a song with them. Scott played electric guitar
and sang backing vocals, and they all seemed to have a good time.
After the second encore she left the stage saying how great the
audience were and that she really enjoyed playing for us. But we
wouldn't let her off the hook that easily, and after a few minutes she
regained the stage, and played a new song, accompanying herself on
acoustic guitar. She introduced it as a song about the belief that
"love can save your life". It was a very nice song, and then she left
the stage, giving her thanks to the audience.
I would have to say that I was favourably impressed by the show. Her
vocals were excellent, even while she was playing other instruments,
and she played them well. The songs were nicely constructed, even the
ballads weren't watered down three-chord pap. The other musicians knew
their parts and on the whole the show proceeded seamlessly. And the
band was seriously lacking in attitude. They were just playing,
singing, having a good time. No posing for effect, no forced emoting.
We all had a good time.
After the show we stuck around (ignoring the bouncers' pleas for us to
leave immediately) and spoke to Dave Gregory and Aimee Mann. Chris was
introduced to her (as if he belonged there) and told her about hearing
her interview on National Public Radio a few weeks ago. He told her
this story: he was shaving, the radio was playing the interview, then
they played a song, so he stopped shaving long enough to listen, and
when he was finally done and out of the bathroom his wife told him to
"buy this". So he did. And he likes it a lot. He says she seems shy
(and very skinny).
Dave Gregory spoke to us for quite some time. He's a very quiet and
very nice fellow, very obliging. But that's a story for Chalkhills.
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