Concert Review: The Church at Shank Hall in Milwaukee · Jun 24, 07:43 AM by Don
Here’s the set list for last night’s Church show at Shank Hall here in Milwaukee:
Tantalized / Block / Day 5 / North, South, East and West / Happenstance / After Everything / Almost With You / A Month of Sundays / Deadman’s Hand / Pangaea / You Took / Operetta / Under the Milky Way / Reptile / Encore #1: An Interlude, Space Saviour / Encore #2: Hotel Womb
Though the show was great overall, by checking the Church message board, Hotel Womb, I’m noticing that the set list has been pretty static for this tour. Womb contributer “KSP” shared the set list from the June 14th Portland show:
Tantalized – sizzling, mindblowing guitar by MWP set the tone for the evening
Block – i love this song and glad to see it is part of their live repertoire
Day 5 – dragged a touch, but rescued at the end by interweaving bits of two other songs
NSEW – I’ve always liked this one
Happenstance – brilliant vocals by Steve & Marty and powerful live
After Everything – understated and sublime
Almost w/You – America doesn’t know this is a classic
Month of Sundays – good but not essential
Deadman’s Hand – Steve on lead guitar & rockin’
Pangaea – glad they played it
You Took – wow, mindblowingly good.
Operetta – beautiful and theatrical vocals and gestures by Steve
UTMW – i know they don’t like playing thus one anymore, but I enjoyed it very much
Reptile – wow…the crowd really responded to this one
An Interlude – a real highlight of the night
Space Savior – they had fun performing this one
Hotel Womb – classic song to end a great show…MWP is a real showman
Friendly warning: This won’t be a formal, well-crafted, and well-polished review. It’s more just a collection of observations. Enjoy!
When I bought a ticket at the box office earlier in the day yesterday (the day of the show), I asked about sales. The box office employee said sales were good. That night (last night) the club was well attended. I don’t know if it was a sellout show, but it was undeniably good attendance for a Tuesday night. The performance itself was great. The band seemed to be having a good time and the crowd was very supportive. My only gripe about the crowd was that the applause for the first encore was pretty tepid. I’m surprised the band came back out. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad they did, as “Space Saviour” was a barn burner. “Space Saviour” prompted a more genuinely enthusiastic call for a second one-song encore comprised of “Hotel Womb.” The band jammed out near the end of the song. That’s one thing the band seemed to really enjoy; a handful of songs received extended intros or outros.
During a semi-improvised massage 3/4 of the way into “Day 5,” lead singer Steve Kilbey sang what I think may have been lyrics from “My Sweet Lord” by George Harrison (please correct me if I’m wrong) and a line or two from “Electric Avenue” by Eddy Grant.
Kilbey mentioned the merch table and cheekily offered that some have called Untitled #23 “the best album ever made… or ever will be made.” (It’s very good, but I wouldn’t go that far. And I didn’t.) He specifically mentioned the double-vinyl edition of #23 before saying they take cash, credit card, or “nude Polaroids.” And, yes, they do take credit card, which was nice, because they have a ton o’ stuff to buy. I bought Back with Two Beasts, Tin Mine, the “Numbers” single, the Coffee Hounds single, and Kilbey’s Live DVD (all for $55).
“Pangaea” was preceded by a silly improvised number Kilbey called “Seaside Shuffle.” Marty “Manson” Piper (his current Charles Manson/Hell’s Angel look is such a departure from the handsomely androgynous look that so captivated my high school girlfriend in the late ’80s) was fixing something on his guitar, so Peter Koppes sat behind the drums and played a light, jazzy beat while Kilbey made up a poem about how you used to be able to walk from Milwaukee to Sydney, an obvious reference to the song that followed.
The epic “You Took” was awesome. I just read Lurie’s Kilbey/Church bio, No Certainty Attached, and I came away with the impression that Koppes was the band’s resident guitar hero in the early ’80s, only to have Willson-Piper usurp that a bit. I say this because it was obvious that Koppes was the guitar hero last night. “You Took” was just one example of this.
While introducing the band, Kilbey joked that drummer Tim Powles was the new guy and has “only been with the band, for what is it, 17 years” (loose paraphrase).
Kilbey introduced “Under the Milky Way” by saying, “This song needs no introduction.” What it does need, in my opinion, is to be excised from the set. I love the song and it’s undeniably a classic, but, like “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” “Where the Streets Have No Name,” and “Stairway to Heaven,” I probably don’t need to ever hear it again. That being said, a close-dancing couple in their late 20s/early 30s near the front of the stage would have disagreed with me. Considering my boredom with the song, it was fun to hear Kilbey goofily shout/sing, “And those Hollywood nights! In those Hollywood hills,” from the Bob Seger song over the final strains of Koppes’ solo.
At one point, Charlie Manson-Biker (must beat that dead horse of a joke) put in a good word for Van der Graaf Generator, who will play at Shank on June 27.
While waiting for the second encore, one guy near me was shouting for “Metropolis.” I wish they had played that song, or similar uptempo numbers. I feel like the set list skewed too midtempo, but that’s a quibble. It was still a great show.
During “Space Saviour,” Powles noticed the mini Stonehenge hanging behind him and banged on it as if was part of his drum kit. As you might expect, the Milwaukee crowd loved this bit of silliness.
Late in the show, Kilbey said the show had been his favorite Shank Hall experience.
mp3: The Church – A Month of Sundays :: (live on KCRW’s SNAP with Deirdre O’Donoghue on March 24, 1988), from Acoustic Sermon (1995)
Photo: Steve Kilbey on stage with the Church at the East Brunswick Club in Melbourne last March. Photographer: thegreensea
FYI: I’ve begun posting at Hotel Womb under the name The Great Machinist.
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Review vs. Review: The Church - Untitled #23 Uncle Jack got sumfin (the new Spoon song, that is)