An intro to this review archive!

PLEASE READ!! - Welcome to Warewolf95's "Idiot Review" archive!!

 Howdy folks! As the title says, welcome to my archive of live show reviews as I have posted on the Steve Hoffman Music Forums website! I pr...

Sunday, March 9, 2025

2022-04-23 New York City, NY

 4 23 22 New York City

Set 1

A reall good Fluffhead opens the show. Trey is very flubby throughout but that's ok considering how energetic and enthusiastic this one is. Inessential but good regardless.

The following Mikes Song builds a good head of steam. Nothing special but definitely enjoyable overall. Same goes for Hydro and Paug. Paug actually gets really great by the end and there are hints of a budding jam that isnt pursued (dang it!). A really GOOD Mikes Groove overall that doesnt disappoint but also doesnt burn down the house.

Up next is what this set is most remembered for - a giant 22 minute Simple outta nowhere!!! The song is good, with the initial type 1 rock jam extending all the way to 13ish minutes. The rock jamming is real tight and not as boring as you might expect. Copious amounts of Party Time jamming/teasing as well! From there the jam breaks down awkwardly like Fuego from the night befor and they literally FORCE it to keep going. Thank god they do!!! They slowly build it up into a dark and monstrous robo stomp funk jam culminating in a full blown Egg In A Hole playthrough at 19 minutes befoe reintroducing the Simple theme and closing it out. That Simple is of course must hear, but honestly it was a bit of a mess. A crazy mess that Im glad exists, but it definitely wasnt the glorious magic of the 8/6/21 Simple etc

Another problem tonight is that Trey is just playing really CHILL. Its like instead of burning fire we are just getting little sparks ....

Divided Sky is up next. Terrific job NAILING the difficult compositional parts!!! Divided Sky is extremely delicate tonight in the best way. Just a terrific version well worth a listen!!!

Average hot First Tube to close

All in all, set 1 was very good. The Simple and Divided Sky were both must hear, but the whole thing still just has this.... underwhelming vibe to it all. Like they are flicking a lighter over and over and only producing sparks. Its really frustrating.

Set 2

Now thats what Im talkin about!! The set opens with a massive 27 minute No Men!! Even better, it RAGES, easily producing more heat than anything in set 1!!! This thing SMOKES!!! No Men is great, if a bit bloated. It never goes "strange", but at least its not chill bliss! Its spends the entirety of its jam in a darkly brooding kind of melodic tenseness. You just get lost in the soup, if you will. Not my favorite jam but it was still must hear, of course.

A spectacular short little Caspian gives us a slight breather . A terrific version, this sounds straight out of 1997 or something!!! Must hear!!

Piper is nice if annoyingly aborted just as the jam gets going, but Jibboo is SPECTACULAR!!!! Truly must hear, that has to be the best soloing Trey has laid down so far in 2022! Exceptional Jibboo!!!

IAWITW is an awkward waste tonight but Lonely Trip is great.

This uneven set ends with a NUCLEAR BOMB Walls of the Cave!! Definitely must hear, this thing annihlates!!!

Nice encore of Wilson, Bowie and More

All in all, a very uneven 2nd set. Caspian, Jibboo and Walls were all must hear, and No Men would be incredible if 10 minutes were chopped off of it. Great show, sure, but the "magic" is still lacking for now. Hmm.  Super uneven run, Im really annoyed that I didnt enjoy most of it that much more.

No comments:

Post a Comment