Good times on the tour this weekend. We’ll start with the Dallas House of Blues show from Friday night and move on later this week to a return of the native to Orange Beach, where the real buzz is on the after-show, what’s reported to have been a blow-out at the Florabama with Hicks and just about everyone he’s every played with. But first, Dallas:

Reader “Cold Shot” shares her concert notes:

1. Rockin’ Pneumonia>Hey Pocky Way – I have the usual blackout and there is nothing written in my notes except for the song title. Everything always seems overwhelming when the show opens. There’s so much intensity coming from audience and stage that nothing registers.

2. Give Me Tonight – Obviously not yet orientated, I have no comments down on this one, either. A friend points out that Loren Gold (keys) and Taylor seemed to be having a lot of humorous interaction on this, particularly around the lines “it’s Friday night” (it was) and “got my good shoes on” (they looked like new shoes…don’t know about good shoes, says friend). She says of all the shows she’s seen there was more of this kind of fun between Loren and Taylor than at other shows. (Note she was not in hazy Seattle…which featured same.)

Another friend notes that it seems that when Taylor is interacting with the players to his left, it’s all about music. And when he’s interacting with the players to his right, it’s personal.

3. Heart and Soul – Taylor repeats the words “jelly roll” a couple of times. I really don’t see the point of this, other than to make a gratuitous connection to a standard blues euphemism while playing in a HOB. But never mind this. During this song, the band lifts off officially with a jumpin’ solo from Josh Smith (guitar). That is for me when the concert really starts. Loren’s grinning from ear to ear, and Al “Boogie” Carty (bass) is totally funked. It strikes me that everyone on stage is smiling. You get the feeling that there is a lot of affection flowing…that these guys are going to miss each other, and they are starting to know it. There’s a perfunctory “Brown Eyed Handsome Man” tag, but at this point, the important stuff was happening on stage between the players. The audience is just observing.
[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=_6xVm7FkH4A]

4. A highlight for me…Call Me The Breeze. A friend and I discuss this right now. We are agreeing that while we love the song, the way these guys do it does not compare to the way Taylor did it with his pre-Idol band. With them, it started out very bare - no fullness of instrumentation…building, building into the first verse. This version is flatter all the way through, and perfectly fine. It’s good to hear it, despite this. For the first time, I really fully appreciate a piano solo by Loren. It has some intensity that’s usually missing (or I usually miss). Or maybe I’m just a Brian Less fan since the first time I heard the pre-idol WorkPlay sets. Yeah. Maybe. Piano solo is followed by guitar solo, then Taylor breaks out into a real roadhouse harp solo. (The word “roadhouse” is scribbled on the paper here - that’s all.) We don’t remember him doing harp solo in Breeze before. Anyone?

Now, here I see on my paper the words: “smiled knowingly/smugly”. I’m grinning now as I think of this. Taylor is standing right next to Josh during Josh’s solo. Taylor faces the audience straight on, but his head is turned to the side as he looks down at Josh playing. Several times, T looks up at his audience, back down at J’s guitar, up at the audience, etc… a smug smile on his face, like…”I have this hot band. This is MY guitar player. It doesn’t get any better than this.”

5. Taylor begins the song he calls “Clive Davis’ song”, Just to Feel That Way. The young girls just down from me extend their arms longingly, desperately, toward Taylor. Their wriggling fingers reach toward him, follow him around the stage like radar, and they silently beg him to come to them, react to them, SEE them. He seems oblivious. He is singing about being broken and wounded, and he doesn’t care that he can’t seem to stop grinning. My attention wanders to Josh Smith. It is not the first time I have seem him sing these lyrics with real emotion. As I jot that observation down, my ears are pierced by an explosion of squeals and screams. Taylor has seen the wee girls. He has touched their hands. They gasp and giggle and hug and swoon. All around them, women and men smile.

6. Now Taylor intro’s the next song. “How many people here have a crazy friend? Here’s Medicated Goo!” That little joke pops everyone out of their groove, and Taylor laughs, the band laughs, we all laugh together. My friend and I are both glad to learn that My Friend will be left out of the set list in favor of some better-loved-Hicks-composition-holdontoyourloveihope. For now, we are in the Goo, and it is good. Taylor lets it go completely, and his players respond instantly to his every move, glance, nuance, as though they all share the same nervous system. This is slick. And there is so much joyous energy pulsing through them and us, it feels as if the building may rise up off the ground a little. There are some unexpected tags here…”Tell us about the boy from New York City” and “lucky old Sun has nothing to do but just roll around heaven all day.”

7. Looks like My Friend makes it into the set list after all. Loren, smiling and nodding, watches Taylor move on the stage. Taylor is taking great pleasure in his musicians. Taylor Hicks is a band guy. This is a close bunch of people. During the harp solo, Al “Boogie” Carty bops over to face sax man Brian Gallagher (sax, flute), and they have a little enthusiastic dance-off moment before Boogie, grinning, gyrates his way back to his spot. It amazes me that after all this time on the road together, living in that bus together, playing all this music together, this can all still be so fresh and fun for them - and for us, for that matter.

8. Wherever I Lay My Hat – I note a little one-handed bass playing by Boogie. Again, Taylor and Loren seem to be sharing a joke. I’m sorry, but I’ve grown accustomed to seeing jaded, bored-looking players on tour. I’ve just never seen anything like the energy and openness that this group brings. It’s the kind of expression you always wish you could see on stage. It’s deeply satisfying for a fan to see. Hard to articulate.

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=7SDDTCV7IeA]

9. Young Turks – I have a little bit of a problem as he does this song. The young turk he’s singing about is the one I want him to be free to be. It’s the raw, uncensored, rough, road-worn musician who will show up finally on the Florabama stage the next night, in a “shadow-tour” version of his own tour. But the one that shows up for the official show each night is letting them “push him around and change his point of view” to some extent. It’s still beyond great, but it’s not young turk/Florabama great for me. That said, there is no shortage of outstanding playing, and the electricity continues to pulse through the room.

10. The Deal – The momentum comes to a halt. For the first time, each player is in his own head. There is no interaction. I don’t know what it means, but there it is. Maybe you just can’t put out like this all night without some kind of personal time to recover.

11. Gonna Move…but first, Taylor grabs his bottle of water, spins off the cap, pauses, and looks at his audience. “Don’t we all know deep down that it’s tap water?” It is, as hoped, the blues arrangement of Gonna Move, as opposed to the Matt Serletic version. And It Is Good - so good that my notes have become illegible. I can make out the word “bump” (Taylor, standing by Boogie), swings a hip out to bump Boogie’s). And there is something that looks like “Wonder if guitar more comf JOSH! Opens juices on Corona business as jazz for Susanoff!” So, that there is the effect of this performance upon this writer: something between loss of fine motor control, and plain incoherence. By this time, Taylor is drenched. His shirt isn’t just wet; it’s saturated, and dripping, so that sweat flies from his elbows when he moves.

12. Heaven Knows, and I get to participate personally in the “What’d I Say” call/response moment. That was nice. The person to my left (no names, please) becomes overwhelmed by Boogie’s masterful bass playing. He’s on fire, and she is shaking her ass, alternately pointing at him with both hands, and wailing on some wicked air bass. This performance (Boogie’s, that is) does not escape Taylor, either. He calls out “BASS!”, and Boogie steps forward into a KILLER bass solo. The person to my left is….pleased. Or gyrating along with Boogie. Take your pick. This is followed by the man who, with Boogie, lays down the foundation for the whole thing every night. “DRUMS!” shouts Taylor, and Felix Pollard delivers a fine, fine drum solo.

13.The Maze – Boogie is irresistible, and Josh sings along. The set list will reveal the musical tour Taylor took us on here, so I won’t repeat it here. What the set list won’t show is that at one point Loren Gold lifted one hand from the keyboard and reached it out to Taylor. Taylor shook Loren’s hand warmly. He then moved on to each player in the band and shook hands with each of them in turn. Nice moment.

14. Now, The Right Place. Finally, this is done The Right Way. Don’t get me wrong – the man delivers this song well with great consistency. What I mean to say is he finally applies the one performance lesson American Idol had to teach him: place the mic stand front and center, place the mic in its cradle, stand still, and just deliver that vocal with some impressive vocal horsepower. He even very briefly had one hand on the mic, and one on the stand a la “You Are So Beautiful”, which I know made several people very, very happy. Standing still, the feeling of the song is not dissipated by movement around the stage. Instead, it all goes into his body language and gestures, and a whole supplementary visual communication of it is now available to us. He seems to physically push the music from himself with real power, and pin us with it. The fans have waited a very, very long time for this moment. I hope we see more of this standing still stuff, because it does something wonderful to his vocals.

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=-GmFZpZZT3I]

15.Runaround – and now Taylor’s all over the stage again, and the happiness flows between the players. Smiles all around the stage. They are having fun with this one. He segues into Willie Brown Blues, and he’s blowing that harp like he wants to hurt us with it. He’s trying to throw us to the back wall with it.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0suZh8LirTE]

16. He prepared to exit the stage. Puts the mic down. Starts repeatedly bending and wooing like he’s on American Idol again. Instant buzz-kill.

17. Encore – Take the Long Way Home – Ahhhhh yes. I’ve wanted to hear that harp intro since the Spring tour. Glad I was in the house for this. Felix is brilliant on the drums in this. Taylor really extends himself toward his audience throughout this one. The house lights come up, and the jammed balcony gets special attention here. It’s really unusual and refreshing to see this unabashed gratitude, appreciation, and feeling coming from a performer. The guy really reaches out.

So, overall, a fine, fine show, worth traveling for, though I’m disappointed this was a House of Blues that allowed children. If not, we might have got something a little closer to the show at the Florabama. Personnel aside, I would choose the adult Florabama show over the tour show 10 times out of 10, and twice on Sundays. And from the uproar in the online community today over the Florabama show, that seems to be the consensus amongst the fans. Some day, some day….

…and some context for the Tequilla dance above in Runaround (thanks “soulkaren” for the pronto upload). Is there a pop-culture dance this guy doesn’t know and won’t do?
[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=UVKsd8z6scw]

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