This week I only went to two shows.
Show number one was Radiohead at the Woodlands. I’ve seen Radiohead on every American tour they’ve done and this show may be their best. The lights were fantastic. They seemed to be having fun. They experimented with the songs (something they haven’t done in the past). I don’t really have any complaints, other than having to deal with thousands of people. And I hate people.
Overheard in the foot traffic bottleneck on the way out:
Random drunk guy number one [to nobody in particular]: “Anybody know a good bar around here?”
Random drunk guy number two : “I’m from Austin. I only know bars in Austin. Houston sucks.”
Show number two was the Police for the second time in a year. Also at the Woodlands (I hate that place). They were reasonably good last time and I was a big fan in my teen years, so I felt some strange obligation to see them again. The band members seemed to be working on this same level of interest. After what I presume has been a year of playing these songs that they wrote over twenty years ago, they seemed like they were going through the motions. Sting made a few good efforts to throw his bandmates curve balls, but they didn’t respond with anything particularly grand. It wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t anywhere near great. I feel sorry for the people who paid $285 to see that mediocrity up close.
I seriously pondered seeing Iron Maiden this week, just to make this the second week in which I went to three musical events, but I really didn’t want to drive all the way out to the Woodlands yet again. So no reportage on that one.
Crap. I apparently picked the wrong Radiohead show to skip. I figured I’d seen them twice before at the Woodlands? What room’s been left for improvement.
It was the lighting and stage show?