The Posies 20th Anniversary at Neumos
Image via Laura Musselman.
By the time The Posies’ second show of the night rolled around, I expected them to be a little tired. A little subdued. They’ve been at this for 20 years, after all, and there wasn’t even an opener for the second set. Just two hours of Posies. They were entitled to need a nap.
Silly me. Does Ken Stringfellow ever stop moving? I spent a lot of the 90’s dancing around my bedroom to the Posies, and Neumos on Saturday felt like that again, reliving my giant adolescent crush on Ken. Everyone in the room was having a great time, applauding happily when their favorite Posies alumni came on to take over the bass or the drums. For the encore Ken and Jon Auer came back out first and sang two songs, just the two of them, and I love them onstage together. The two hours passed in a pleasant blur, and there’s nothing even really to say about the show, except that it was delightful. No matter what they’re doing they always seem to come back to the Posies, and there’s a reason for that.
I don’t know about you, but remembering how great the Posies have been for the last 20 years makes me even more excited for Sub Pop’s 20th anniversary hoedown. Way to make excellent music, Seattle.
Since the second show was added on later I don’t think that it was sold out, but Neumos was remarkably pleasant, not packed and sweaty like I was expecting. (The same can also be said for last night’s Tokyo Police Club show, which was sold out, but more on that later.) I think that the abrupt nature of the latest nightlife crackdown at Neumos [Slog] is poorly handled–you can’t just spring that on a large venue– but the club does get really overcrowded. Saturday night the sound was great and the room was not a hellhole, and it turned out to be one of the best nights I’ve had at Neumos in a long while.
Did any of you catch the first show? How was that?
Laura Musseleman is a hell of a show photographer.
The first show was damned hot, that’s what it was. But great. No songs from Failure, which saddened me, but otherwise awesome.
The Posies Shows and the CD Release Party
I was at both Posies shows at Neumos, as my Burning Sky Records label (composed of me - Alan Heaton - and Seattle native Steve Turnidge) was celebrating the release of our new CD "Beautiful Escape: The Songs of The Posies Revisited" at a CD Release Party at Neumos. (You can read all about it and even get your own copy at http://www.myspace.com/theposiestributealbum).
I first thought that the fact that The Posies were playing two shows was great news (and it turned out to be), but it was actually a bit of a logistical nightmare at first. I spent much of Thursday on the phone with Ken and Jon, trying to figure out how we could accommodate all of the "Beautiful Escape" artists who were traveling from all over the world to attend. Steve – who was totally heroic all weekend – ran out on Thursday afternoon and bought up almost all of the remaining available tickets so that people would be covered, and as it turned out, virtually everyone was. Thanks to Steve, Jon, and Ken for working so hard to make things work out!
There were two opening bands for the first show –Dear John Letters and Preston School of Industry. Jon played drums for much of the set with Dear John Letters (who had a nice powerpop sound), and all four of the current Posies joined the Preston School of Industry at some point during their set, which had a bit of a Wilco vibe to it and was very good.
Finally it was time for The Posies to come on. The hall was packed to capacity, and people were extremely excited to see them appear on stage. I hadn’t seen The Posies play since the "Amazing Disgrace" tour when I saw them at the 9:30 Club in Washington DC, so this was a huge thrill for me, particularly on our special night. "Beautiful Escape" artists Maxi Dunn, Eric Galdes (Slinkyredfoot), Don Mabus, and Alex Smee were all there and as excited as I was. I won’t pretend to be able to recite the entire set list for either show, but I can tell you that they opened show #1 with "Throwaway," "Please Return It," and "Conversations" – only 3 of my favorite Posies tracks. The band was really on, and the crowd was loving it. Ken was racing all over the stage in his Iggy Pop – Raw F*CKING Power t-shirt. Jon was also ripping monster riffs all over the place, and Matt Harris and Darius Minwalla were laying down the groove.
What was really cool was that EVERY past and present Posies member was in attendance, and every one of them took the stage at some point. Not long into show #1 Jon and Ken called Posies (and "Beautiful Escape") artists Joe Bass and Brian Young onto the stage, where they took over the bass and drums, respectively. I am forgetting some of what they played, but they did a scorching rendition of "Daily Mutilation" that blew me away – it was a thrill for be to be able to see this lineup play together again – they just killed! Dapper former bass player Rick Roberts (I was wondering who the guy in the suit was when he walked in) also joined the band for a couple of tracks, as did Mike Musburger and Dave Fox, who did a long and blistering take on "Burn and Shine."
As the first show was nearing the end, I turned to Steve and said something like, "This is awesome, but I’m sorry that they haven’t plugged ‘Beautiful Escape’ yet." Within 30 seconds of those words leaving my mouth Ken and Jon started what turned out to be a wonderfully nice and extremely gracious plug for "Beautiful Escape" and for Burning Sky Records – we even got a nice cheer from the audience, which was very cool. (Thanks, guys!)
Soon after that the first show was over and Jon and Ken joined Steve, Tom and I behind the Merch Table. It was crazy – Ken, Jon, and I were all selling stuff simultaneously (with Ken and Jon also signing tons of stuff), and I was trying to make change for all of us at the same time. It all worked out and we actually sold a lot of copies of BET SOFT PR and the EP, but it was pretty intense there for a bit.
Everyone then regrouped, the room was cleared, and the second show began. At this point I got to meet Joe Bass’ daughter Brette Howard (who sung "Start A Life" on "Beautiful Escape") as well as Dan Shapiro and Mike Boise from tiny Tendrils – Dan and Mike had driven all night from Montana to make the show. Paul Mariz (The Calculus Affair) was also there for the second show.
The second show was much like the first, except it was all Posies this time, and they did even more tracks. This is by no means a complete list of all of the songs that they played during the night, but here’s most of them:
Dream All Day
Flavor of the Month (both shows)
Please Return It (both shows)
Throwaway (both shows – I think)
Burn and Shine (both shows)
At Least For Now (Don Mabus - who did the track on "Beautiful Escape" - went nuts)
Song #1 (both shows)
Start A Life (a show #2 highlight)
Ontario
You Avoid Parties (awesome)
Somehow Everything (pretty sure)
Everybody Is a F*cking Liar
Suddenly Mary
Conversations
Definite Door
Solar Sister (both shows)
Daily Mutilation (staggering!)
Terrorized (I wasn’t expecting that)
I Guess You’re Right
Precious Moments
Earlier Than Expected
You’re The Beautiful One (show #2 closer)
Love Letter Boxes
Second Time Around
That Don’t Fly
I Finally Found A Jungle I Like! (I love that song!)
Hate Song
Any Other Way (both shows)
Wow! That’s even more songs than I thought! As you can see, it was truly an amazing night of Posies music. As in the first show all of the past Posies members again joined the stage to play with the band again, and it was equally great. As the set neared a close, Ken and Jon again gave a super-nice plug for "Beautiful Escape." Finally, the performance was over, and the audience left happy and spent.
All in all, it was a truly special night, and Steve and I were honored to be a part of it. To have The Posies hold a CD Release Party at their special 20th annversary ashow was more than we could have ever hoped for when we started the project. I hope that you’ll check out the album - it really is pretty amazing, and a 100% slam-dunk if you’re a Posies fan - which you must be if you’ve read this far. :)
http://www.myspace.com/theposiestributealbum
Cheers,
Alan Heaton
Burning Sky Records
burningskyrecords@gmail.com
Wow, Alan, that was great! Thanks. I’m sad that I didn’t get to see any of the openers from the first set, and I was too busy watching to write down a list of songs. Thanks for the details!