Midtown Music Festival review Review of The Black Crowes at the Midtown Music Festival, 5/3/96 [Submitted by Jenna K. Skopp] without a set list in front of me, let's see what i can recall... um.... ddbb went on a bit late (like 8:15) and while i was hoping for chris to sing with them (come on, he did it in philly....), he didn't, but steve and marc jammed to them on either side (there is a wisdom and a rage, yeah) of the stage... they went off on time... with gregory (lead dude, i guess you could say) saying, "it's about time to bring up the black crooooooowes".... just like on the amorica or bust tour... so the time between ddbb and the crowes seemed endless. my friends and i (val and nicki and my friend marcia {from atlanta}) were up against the barrier in front of rich....guess that qualifies as the first row).... so the crew was inept. totally.... because this is not a tour, i think everyone was hired hands... don't know if they're there to stay or were only hired for the midtown... but the only tech we recognized was noodle- steve's tech.. and in some of the midtown tallest shots from before the show... rich is at least on tech #3 since amorica or bust (also got, or is at least now using, a new gibson), and i didn't recognize ed's tech... and doomer (marc's & jeff cease's tech since forever) is no longer with the band.. so i do believe we can attribute technical difficulties throughout the night and the delay in coming on to this make-shift crew.... no special stage... just oriental rugs. the actual lay out of the festival was such that the blockbuster stage was see-through.. there was no 'backstage' to speak of... in fact, during the fiji mariners and the ddbb, we could look under/through the stage and see chris and whomever else was walking around..... so the stage itself backed up to new apartments or condominiums... pretty weird.. 96 rock (atlanta sponsors) flashed their logo on the building throughout the evening... people were standing out on the balconies (yes, jason.. people do go out on balconies :)) during the show.. um.... so crowes went on around 10:30... crowd seemed crazy... i saw at least 5 people be passed overhead and over the barriers... drugs, trampling, you name it... pushing, etc didn't seem to be much of a problem where we were.. maybe only because we were at the front... so they take the stage (it's about time, jenna)... i would delve momentarily into how they looked, but i guess that's ridiculous considering that the pictures are up on the web page.. man: wish i had the set list... ok.. under a mountain. good opener (i decided)... at least where i was, the mix sucked... rich, rich, and more rich.. ok, maybe that's because we were right in front of his stack.. but marc was (at times) inaudible, and chris was difficult to hear.. as was ed.. as the show went on, things got better... but i talked to someone on the other side, and they got a bass overdose... who knew? sting me fell naturally into the 2nd slot it so often took on high as the moon.. and i was definitely surpised to hear hotel illness on the heels of a fellow southern harmony tune... share the ride has grown on me... i dig the beginning a lot more than the tune itself... nicki and i've talked about how we thought their covering dixon's mellow down easy made them want to write a similar tune, so boy were we surprised to hear mellow down without even a break between the two... that was great! put a big ole smile on my face.... and share the ride wasn't as square as the cotton club... don't know if jam is an accurate term, but it definitely was extended... chris' harmonica solo in share the ride was the transition to mellow down... well what else, sister luck... cool, but lull of the show (i provided the disclaimer that this is only my humble opinion....)... by this time, it's at least a little bit weird that there are no amorica tunes to be found... come on- get crazy with 'gone'... so i decide later on that there was stategy imposed in writing the set list... that they may have thought amorica tunes (let's face it- how many outsiders know p.25 london?) would confuse the issue... that the point is to play 'rock n' roll'.... and that symm tunes and even sh&mc are familiar... but i think they wanted a clear delineation between new stuff and not new stuff. and amorica material would blur that line... do i make sense? Anyway.. many technical difficulties and/or just plain inept time spent trying to hook my banjo boy up... i was unfortunately talking at the time, so i didn't hear chris' introduction... thought it was gary louris at first (if he cut about 5 inches off his hair).. so like jeff tweedy did on horde, this guy (an old atlanta pal was my impression by the way chris was talking) stood next to rich. so good friday was cool... stayed pretty true to the cotton club version... do we have a hit on our hands? does it have a good beat and will the kids dance to it?? guess that remains to be seen.. If i'm skipping stuff, please forgive me... jealous again.. nothing spectacular.. rich remembered his lines.. ok, it was a sweet jealous again for dumb sentimental jenna reasons (big ole smile and eyebrow action number 2, right val?).. I got rich's set list at the end, and found that stare it cold was to be played but was scrapped.. my guess is that it was sacrificed to time... a shame.. the highlight of santa barbra (for me) was the ddbb with the crowes on stare it cold and that coulda happened.... but as y'all heard, the ddbb did join the crowes for hard to handle.. that was cool... especially because they just started jamming hard to handle over the summer in europe, and by that time, the ddbb were no longer touring with the crowes... so this marked the first time they joined the crowes for hard to handle w/jam.. really good... if i gotta hear hard to handle, this is how i want to hear it. So then girl from the pawn shop... at first not overly impressive, but it's growing on me after more listens... so it's an older tune... it would be interesting to know why they resurrected this one.. if anyone has the eerie, pa show from 93.. they did it there... it would be also interesting to trace the evolution of the song... i heard title song in 1993 and was almost disappointed that it didn't change much between then and when i heard it in 95.. whereas we all know how radical the evolution of tied up and swallowed was... (hey chris, what do you say we take two tunes and slam 'em together??)... so the point is that i'd like to hear how much girl from the pawn shop has changed since its high as the moon run... confirmation from marc ford that it's on the hot new album.. ok, this is geeky, but the coolest feature about girl from the pawn shop is it's irregular form... not your straight aaba form... it actually goes somewhere.... where, jenna? and chris sings it 'she-style'.. though this song isn't quite as melancholy. So then pimper's and remedy... nothing crazy.... pimper's seemed to lack energy and remedy was downright... well, not good... rich had evidently given up... chris even made reference earlier in the evening to the science fiction nightmare (ok, i'm paraphrasing, so sue me...) of rich's amps... during remedy, rich must have decided to eliminate any breakdown section.... whereas his eye contact with marc and steve usually suffices, rich literally had to point and get ed's attention to take the breakdown bit... but by the time ed got it, rich took it back with his entrance at the end.... so no encore. i think i knew there woudn't be one... between the time restriction (not sure if midnight was a strictly-enforced curfew or not) and technical whatevers... no encore... though it was ambiguous... i think even the stage crew and tech's were looking for the yae or nae (sp?) to know what to do before the 'house lights' eventually went up... oh, and for nerds like me who keep track, chris picked coltrane for the before show music selection... c'est la fin...