Ottawa - how was Xavier Rudd?

[Del]

Due to a general lack of tickets, plus the fact I had to work at 7am today, I couldn't make it last night... How was the show?

[bradm]

I'd call it good (pretty good, actually) but not great. It was long (over two hours, including the encore, and it was one big set), but I don't think he had the energy level high enough for long enough during the show. There was a bit too much of the low-energy "plunking on the wood" stuff, and I felt he never really had full control of the crowd. (Remember those, uh, "enthusiastic" females from the Friday BluesFest show? They were back...) When he lit up on "To Let" or "Conceal Me", the show took off, but he needed to get across more of that kind of stuff, I think, for the show to have been at the leve of the Friday Blues Fest show.

Nine Mile, the opening band, were, well, not really memorable. It was a duo, acoustic guitar/vocals and a guy sitting and banging on a box. Try to imagine Dave Matthews trying to play Ben Harper tunes. I can see the appeal, but I didn't find the music that deep.

On the plus side, I got a really good recording. My mics were directly (like, one foot) FOB, and, thanks for a power outlet from the sound booth (which I asked for; the sound guy remembered me from the Blues Fest show; he was working one of the boards there, I think), I ran the full rig. (Bring on GTB/JSB next week!)

Aloha,

Brad

[AD]

Hey there.. My friend showed up at 10 and just had to pay cover to get in... Apparently it wasn't sold out beforehand, and they weren't even doing a waiting list. There were a lot of people inside but it wasn't uncomfortably crowded, you could move around fairly freely.

Due to my bender I missed the first two acts, got there Just as Xavier went on and I managed to get on the floor about 6 rows back. The show was good, but not great. He's gotta kick it up above mellow way more often for me to really get into his music. Love his didg playing though, he gets some great sound out of those mofos.

I give the show a 7.5 out of 10.1.

Now I'm hungover.

AD

[Alexis]

Sounds like he may have used up all his energy in Toronto. The Horseshoe was PACKED (think way worse than the BNB reunion show) and you could barely move. There was definitely a very high energy level there from the crowd and you could tell that he was picking up from it, even though we in the crowd could do nothing more than bob our heads it was so packed. Xavier commented on it a few times. He told us he'd just got back from a week long surfing holiday in Mexico and he wasn't used to using his "playing muscles" maybe he was just a bit sore and tired for your show Ottawa.

I started maybe 6 rows back, but finished out the show 2nd row. There were a few "enthusiastic females" in the front row here too. I heard a few Aussies talking throughout the night and I heard 5+ different people talk about how akin the music was to Paul Simon's Graceland. I'm not good on the track titles, but he played his entire Buffalo set -1 or 2 songs, and a few new ones as well. His stories were interesting for the most part and he spoke of how he felt a special connection with Canada.

I heard some guy talking to his chick friend about how the bass parts for most of the songs were pre-recorded midi tracks that the guitar tuner guy set up for him. I turned around to correct this HUGE error, and a member of Xavier's entourage quickly came to my rescue (the guy didn't believe me, he "worked in music") and said Xavier would be disgusted to hear this guy spewing this crap like he new what he was talking about. It's 100% real live sound.

I agree with everyone that his mellower stuff definitely brings you down off the high energy you get from his faster songs. He spread them out though, so it wasn't so bad, and most of the mellower songs were pretty short. We only got one of the box songs (incidentally, he told us how he got that box in Toronto). We also got an encore, 4 or 5 quick songs. The total length of the set was around 2+ hours. I really wish he would play out some of his more upbeat songs, i mean at least past the 5 minute mark. But I really can't complain, it's great music. Put a big smile on my face after a hard day.

[meggo]

Hey there.. My friend showed up at 10 and just had to pay cover to get in... Apparently it wasn't sold out beforehand, and they weren't even doing a waiting list.

what the.... what were these nasty "sold out" rumours?? that's odd. i did enjoy my many, many hours of needed rest but still... ah well. it is going to be a bizzay month!!!