The Verve - April 28 & 29, 2008

WaMu Theater at MSG [9 pm both nights] ~$40-$50

Yup, I went to both nights. I was a Verve fanatic in the early 90s. I was obsessed with A Storm in Heaven, No Come Down, A Northern Soul and all the singles... ...ok, notice I didn't reference Urban Hymns. Yes, it has some great songs ("Come On", "Rolling People"), but most of the good songs come from their older days. Ahhh, anyway, the show.

First, WaMu and MSG suck!!! I hate this venue. I saw The Shins there and hated that too for similar reasons. It was a poor setting and I wish bands would get over the "played MSG" focus and play some of our finer music institutions. ...so, the band hit the stage exactly at 9 pm on Monday, and of course I was late. My friend and I had general admission tickets for the area in front of the stage so that was a good thing (we thought). We arrived while The Verve were playing "Space and Time." We were annoyed to hear that we missed "A New Decade" and "This is Music", two excellent songs, but we were able to catch that the next night. It must be said that we were happy to have general admission tickets, but the sound in front of the stage was rather poor. The music was too loud and most of the instrumentation was lost (Nick, of course, sounded great and we were very happy to be up close and personal to see all his fretboard magic). The set list from there was decent (again too much Vervecroft, Urban Hymns stuff). The highlights for me were, "Already There" (simply beautiful), "Gravity Grave" (thankfully Simon Jones keep playing this bass line in between songs which prompted Richard and the band to play it off the cuff), "Life's and Ocean" (marvellous!), "History" (sounded great, even without the strings), and the "new" (old) song "Sit and Wonder" (an excellent song they resurrected from their vault). As one can see, they mostly played Urban Hymns shite...ohh! And, the last song of the night was a new one...a horrendous, horrifying new song...Richard called it "Love is Pain" in New York, but many Verve fans on the net state that he called it "Love is Noise" at other shows. Wow, what an awful sample. The sample was a vocal of Richard going "Ooo Ooo, Ooo Ooo, Ooo Ooo - ahh ahh, ahh ahh, ahh ahhh". They must drop this one... With this thought I left night one rather disappointed realizing the recent London set lists, which included "All in the Mind", "Let the Damage Begin", etc., wouldn't be happening at MS-fuckin'-G.

Tuesday night turned out better than I expected. For one, we were on time and caught "A New Decade" and "This is Music" as I had mentioned. (Though we did have to sit through "Sonnet". What an awful song - sorry I'm a bit negative, but the Urban Hymns fans and MSG staff drove me nuts, plus the song, really, really sucks!) The sound from the 200 seats (smack dab in the middle) was excellent. The band sounded great, so that was a major improvement. The highlights from Tuesday were similar, the only difference was that they played "A Man Called Sun" (thankfully they played one of their greatest!!!) and "Velvet Morning". Richard's antics were reassuring as they were in the 90s, with his fist punching, cursing, and other shenanigans. Simon and Nick were their more low key self on Tuesday, as opposed to Simon's out of character exuberance on Monday night. Tuesday night turned out to reassure my faith in a band that should have a few more songs to offer the music loving crowd.

When all is said and done, I felt that both nights together created one rather good (though not great) show. They may not come close to comparing their Irving Plaza gigs, but they were great to see again.

Monday's Set List:

New Decade
Sonnet
This Is Music
Space In Time
Life's An Ocean
Already There
Weeping Willow
Sit and Wonder (new)
The Rolling People
Gravity Grave
Drugs Don't Work
Lucky Man
Come On

Encore: History
Bittersweet Symphony
Love Is Pain (new)

Tuesday's Set List:

A New Decade
Sonnet
This Is Music
Space & Time
Life's An Ocean
Already There
Weeping Willow
Sit and Wonder (new)
The Rolling People
A Man Called Sun
Velvet Morning
Drugs Don't Work
Lucky Man
Come On

Encore: Bittersweet Symphony
Love Is Pain (new)

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