Same Show, Different Night

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potatoeater
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Same Show, Different Night

Post by potatoeater »

So there may be a similar thread for this already but my light searching didn't turn it up. I am wondering how many of you have found yourselves disappointed after going to see a big time band multiple nights in a row and basically seeing the same show back to back. Fortunately/unfortunately I have never experienced this myself. Most of my concert going experiences have been single show trips or festivals. Excluding of course DBT, where this isn't ever a problem. However I just grabbed four newly released Led Zeppelin SBD bootlegs from DIME, in my excitement I didn't even bother paying much attention to the set lists, only to find they are basically the same show night after night after night.

Have the DBTs just spoiled me on the whole no set lists, "feed off the crowd", "live in the moment" approach to rock shows or is this a legitimate complaint, in your expert opinions?

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by pearlbeer »

One of my all time favorite artists, James McMurtry, who I have seen live...I don't know...40 times? 50? Is guilty of this offense. Given his extensive and excellent catalog, it drives me crazy.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by tinnitus photography »

if you are playing a big production arena show, a lot of the time the set list is fixed beceause of lighting and other production that's hard to change on the fly.

but yeah, bands should always have a healthy familiarity w/ their discography.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Zip City »

With modern lighting control systems, it isn’t hard to shuffle songs night to night. That’s just laziness.

MMJ has a decently complex light show, and they shuffle their setlist nightly.

Roger Waters could play his set in any order he wants, even with all the video, with very little extra work. Artists just get comfortable
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by beantownbubba »

DBT is pretty unusual both in the effort they put into varying their sets and in having some respect and care for their audience. I do not understand fans who follow bands around and watch the same show night after night. I have no idea what they get out of it. I even remember some AC/DC fans writing the band an "open letter" respectfully begging that the band change it up at least a little, which the band proceeded to do ... not at all.

Springsteen rose to fame in part because he had an attitude similar to what we associate w/ DBT. Even when he moved up to arenas he varied the sets much more than was typical then and now and even called the occasional audible within the changed sets. At the stadium level it is (or at least was) harder to do, but he at least tried and always changed at least a couple of songs plus having the nightly audience request song.

But bands like DBT and Springsteen & the E Streeters are few and far between.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

I can recall many Grateful Dead tours I did, 15-20 shows at a time, in which there were never repeats from night to night and most core songs were played no more than twice, with exceptions of the rare times they were working new material into the repertoire. In addition, they often put key songs (Dark Star, St. Stephen, Box of Rain, Help on the Way>Slipknot>Franklin's Tower, Ripple, Casey Jones, etc.) on the shelf for years at a time, sometimes for even a decade or more.

Hell, I went to nearly 60 GD shows in 1985 alone and there were more than a handful of songs that I saw only once that year, and some that I didn't catch at all.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Iowan »

Jason is pretty guilty of this.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Iowan »

pearlbeer wrote:One of my all time favorite artists, James McMurtry, who I have seen live...I don't know...40 times? 50? Is guilty of this offense. Given his extensive and excellent catalog, it drives me crazy.
That's surprising. I've only seen him twice, and it was a pretty different show. Granted it was about 4 years between shows and "Complicated Game" had just come out before the second one.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Sterling Bigmouth »

Iowan wrote:Jason is pretty guilty of this.
I hear this a lot about Jason, but in his defense the 4 times I’ve seen him live he’s done a fairly decent job of mixing things up, playing his newer stuff, pulling out some DBT material, etc. Granted, one of the shows I went to was acoustic and another was just him and Amanda, but I think he’s done a good job starting with the 6 night run at the Ryman.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Clams »

beantownbubba wrote:DBT is pretty unusual both in the effort they put into varying their sets and in having some respect and care for their audience. I do not understand fans who follow bands around and watch the same show night after night. I have no idea what they get out of it. I even remember some AC/DC fans writing the band an "open letter" respectfully begging that the band change it up at least a little, which the band proceeded to do ... not at all.

Springsteen rose to fame in part because he had an attitude similar to what we associate w/ DBT. Even when he moved up to arenas he varied the sets much more than was typical then and now and even called the occasional audible within the changed sets. At the stadium level it is (or at least was) harder to do, but he at least tried and always changed at least a couple of songs plus having the nightly audience request song.

But bands like DBT and Springsteen & the E Streeters are few and far between.
Not having a set list was one of the (many) things that sold me on DBT when I discovered them 10 years ago. For whatever reasons, I think most bands feel a need for structure in their live shows. I guess they figure the fewer things left to chance the better. Springsteen always seems to have a framework for each tour, where certain songs are played in the same slot at every show while there are always a few slots left open for alternates or outright audibles. That seems like a pretty good compromise if you ask me.
Last edited by Clams on Thu Feb 22, 2018 11:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by beantownbubba »

Clams wrote:
beantownbubba wrote:DBT is pretty unusual both in the effort they put into varying their sets and in having some respect and care for their audience. I do not understand fans who follow bands around and watch the same show night after night. I have no idea what they get out of it. I even remember some AC/DC fans writing the band an "open letter" respectfully begging that the band change it up at least a little, which the band proceeded to do ... not at all.

Springsteen rose to fame in part because he had an attitude similar to what we associate w/ DBT. Even when he moved up to arenas he varied the sets much more than was typical then and now and even called the occasional audible within the changed sets. At the stadium level it is (or at least was) harder to do, but he at least tried and always changed at least a couple of songs plus having the nightly audience request song.

But bands like DBT and Springsteen & the E Streeters are few and far between.
Not having a set list was one of the (many) things that sold me on DBT when I discovered them 10 years ago. For whatever reasons, I think most bands feel a need for structure in their live shows. I guess they figure the fewer things left to chance the better. Springsteen always seems to have a set list framework for each tour, where certain songs are played in the same slot at every show while there are always a few slots left open for alternates or outright audibles. That seems like a pretty good compromise if you ask me.
Yes to all of that.

WWCD: I seriously didn't think it was necessary to mention the Dead because if they're known for anything it's their freeform sets, but for the record the Grateful Dead never had set lists and always varied the sets, often 100% from one night to the next. Better?
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Bill in CT
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Bill in CT »

Iowan wrote:Jason is pretty guilty of this.
This is true except for the annual Ryman run. Of course, we don't all go to the Ryman shows.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Bill in CT »

Some bands that use setlists also mix them up a lot.

Pearl Jam uses a setlist every night but probably mixes up their setlists as much or more than any other band outside of the jam band realm. In October 2009 when they played 4 shows at the Philly Spectrum to close the place down, I saw them do over 100 different songs over the course of the run. That's an extreme example but you get the idea.

Widespread Panic uses a setlist and makes sure that they don't repeat any songs over 3 shows...not only when they do 3 in the same venue but 3 1-nighters (though the latter is not really done anymore due to their changed touring plans). When I saw them do 4 shows at Red Rocks in 2013, they didn't repeat any songs over the entire run.

On the other hand there are bands like Rush. I love their music and saw them 5 times but they were not known for switching it up. My first Rush show was in 2007 on the Snakes & Arrows tour. I saw them again on the 2nd leg of the tour in 2008. They had dropped 3 songs from the setlist and added 3 others. Those were the only changes to the setlist between the 1st and 2nd legs.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Zip City »

DBT is great for the spontaneity, but I really like knowing that some bands do multi-night runs in a venue and never repeat songs. MMJ is great with this. The Avett Brothers (not popular here, but whatever) played 4 nights at Red Rocks and played 4 completely unique 25 song sets.

How awesome would it be for Homecoming to have 3 nights with no repeats? How many more deep cuts would be heard?
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Clams »

Bill in CT wrote:
Iowan wrote:Jason is pretty guilty of this.
This is true except for the annual Ryman run. Of course, we don't all go to the Ryman shows.
Bill from Connecticut is an elitist I see.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by 211poundsofpork »

Phish did the total opposite last summer (to generally great reviews), playing 13 shows at MSG without one repeat. The only I problem I saw with this after hearing the entire run for the most part were the bust-outs: a lot of them sounded like they had cobwebs if you know what I mean.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

beantownbubba wrote:
Clams wrote:
beantownbubba wrote:DBT is pretty unusual both in the effort they put into varying their sets and in having some respect and care for their audience. I do not understand fans who follow bands around and watch the same show night after night. I have no idea what they get out of it. I even remember some AC/DC fans writing the band an "open letter" respectfully begging that the band change it up at least a little, which the band proceeded to do ... not at all.

Springsteen rose to fame in part because he had an attitude similar to what we associate w/ DBT. Even when he moved up to arenas he varied the sets much more than was typical then and now and even called the occasional audible within the changed sets. At the stadium level it is (or at least was) harder to do, but he at least tried and always changed at least a couple of songs plus having the nightly audience request song.

But bands like DBT and Springsteen & the E Streeters are few and far between.
Not having a set list was one of the (many) things that sold me on DBT when I discovered them 10 years ago. For whatever reasons, I think most bands feel a need for structure in their live shows. I guess they figure the fewer things left to chance the better. Springsteen always seems to have a set list framework for each tour, where certain songs are played in the same slot at every show while there are always a few slots left open for alternates or outright audibles. That seems like a pretty good compromise if you ask me.
Yes to all of that.

WWCD: I seriously didn't think it was necessary to mention the Dead because if they're known for anything it's their freeform sets, but for the record the Grateful Dead never had set lists and always varied the sets, often 100% from one night to the next. Better?

I wasn’t using setlist in the literal sense of a piece of paper with the songs to be played written down, but merely the songs that were actually played

I see your point about it not needing to be said, I considered that before posting, but I have learned from experience that not everyone is familiar with the GD approach
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by beantownbubba »

whatwouldcooleydo? wrote:I wasn’t using setlist in the literal sense of a piece of paper with the songs to be played written down, but merely the songs that were actually played
Presumably some minor misunderstanding that I can't trace but yes, that's what I've been assuming everyone on the thread meant.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

beantownbubba wrote:
whatwouldcooleydo? wrote:I wasn’t using setlist in the literal sense of a piece of paper with the songs to be played written down, but merely the songs that were actually played
Presumably some minor misunderstanding that I can't trace but yes, that's what I've been assuming everyone on the thread meant.
You said that the Dead "never had setlists"
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by potatoeater »

Clams wrote:Bill from Connecticut is an elitist I see.
Please keep this elitist joke going. I'm already thinking of T-Shirt ideas...
beantownbubba wrote:Springsteen rose to fame in part because he had an attitude similar to what we associate w/ DBT.
I've seen Springsteen once. It was a June show, Bonnaroo. He played Santa Clause Is Coming To Town. That's what I'd call switching it up.

EDIT: After a YouTube search I see this is a sort of regular thing for him. I must admit (please don't shame me) I've never followed Springsteen's live performances closely.
tinnitus photography wrote:if you are playing a big production arena show, a lot of the time the set list is fixed beceause of lighting and other production that's hard to change on the fly.

but yeah, bands should always have a healthy familiarity w/ their discography.
I understand that, I respect that aspect of a show but I could honestly not care less about an elaborate light show. I would take deep cuts, jams, random covers and unique experiences over elaborate, synchronized light and video any night, with any band.
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by scotto »

For several years in the '80s Sun Ra would do a weeks-long residence in KC at a little dinner club/R&B joint. This being the height of musical amazingness, many of us would go every night we could and sit through what was essentially the exact same set, But! Ra and the Arkestra were so freeform that even the exact same setlist was never really the exact same setlist: There was always some sort of twist on a solo or a new rap or an extended vamp that made it totally different. Which I guess just proves: Always go to the show.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by beantownbubba »

scotto wrote:For several years in the '80s Sun Ra would do a weeks-long residence in KC at a little dinner club/R&B joint. This being the height of musical amazingness, many of us would go every night we could and sit through what was essentially the exact same set, But! Ra and the Arkestra were so freeform that even the exact same setlist was never really the exact same setlist: There was always some sort of twist on a solo or a new rap or an extended vamp that made it totally different. Which I guess just proves: Always go to the show.
While Sun Ra is certainly out there on the right of the experimental/exploration curve, I think I'd argue that if 2 jazz shows were the same then something's wrong, even if the band/musician plays the exact same set. Generally, the songs should be the setting for the improvisation/solos. From one night to the next the differences might not be profound but if they're playing it the same then they're not improvising and then what's the point?
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Iowan »

The Black Crowes used setlists, but mixed them night to night.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by Zip City »

MMJ just had their One Big Holiday festival and they played every album straight through over 3 nights. Night One was Tennessee Fire and At Dawn, Night Two was It Still Moves and Z, and Night Three was Evil Urges, Circuital and The Waterfall.

Only repeated song over the three nights was an encore of One Big Holiday to close Night Three
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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by tinnitus photography »

good thing they didn't close night 3 w/ a Yim Yames song and ruin everyone's weekend.

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Re: Same Show, Different Night

Post by allisonsdc »

tinnitus photography wrote:good thing they didn't close night 3 w/ a Yim Yames song and ruin everyone's weekend.
:lol: good ole' YimmerYammer
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