It’s taken a few days to recover from a total lack of sleep, jet lag, and cramming a lifetime of stuff into less than 48 hours in Los Angeles. But what a great couple of days. I saw friends, family, Gwen, and my favourite band twice at a fabulous venue (the Greek Theatre). The sound was terrific both nights; in particular Phil’s drums just sounded phenomenal.
Night one I already briefly mentioned in this post with the Follow Me Around video I shot. The show wasn’t Radiohead’s best, but it was my first time hearing the new songs in person and they all came across so much better in person than on the bootlegs floating around (no surprises really). And of course hearing Follow Me Around live was a treat (it was my third time hearing it which makes me some sort of talisman for that song given it’s rareness).
And while I’m not one to idolize celebrities, it was hilarious looking around the venue and seeing Beck, Tobey Maguire, Rene Russo and others…all sitting behind me (thanks WASTE!). On night two We saw Marilyn Manson, Woody Harrelson, Leonardo DiCaprio, Gavin and Gwen (below!)…it was surreal.
Night two was a far better show and you could tell it was going to be by the second song, The National Anthem; the song was immense and the band didn’t let up through a rather lengthy 25 song set. Whereas we were treated to Follow Me Around the night before, Thom threw in a (more or less) complete take on True Love Waits as an intro to Everything In Its Right Place on night 2.
Night two was the first time I’d heard Bodysnatchers and it definitely climbed higher on my list of favourite new songs. 15 Step did the same – how great is this song live? It was also nice to hear Bones as I hadn’t seen it performed since I first saw the band in 1998; although Black Star would have been better (or A REMINDER). Now if only the band could stop playing House of Cards in the encore and people could resist the urge to scream like a fratboy during the quiet bits of Exit Music; it doesn’t make you cool. The setlist for the June 30 show at the Greek ran:
01 Airbag
02 The National Anthem
03 There There
04 15 Step
05 Exit Music
06 Bodysnatchers
07 My Iron Lung
08 Nude
09 Videotape
10 I Might Be Wrong
11 Climbing Up The Walls
12 All I Need
13 Pyramid Song
14 Spooks
15 Idioteque
16 Myxomatosis
17 Bangers ‘n Mash
18 Bones
—–
19 Like Spinning Plates
20 Fake Plastic Trees
21 Down Is The New Up
22 Paranoid Android
—–
23 House of Cards
24 True Love Waits
25 Everything In Its Right Place
If you use torrents and have a DIME account you can download the show here. If you don’t use torrents you can download the show in mp3 form from this site. Still waiting on a recording from night one. There’s also this little snippet of a new song that has yet to be played to an audience – this was recorded at a soundcheck and we don’t know what it’s title is yet.
Download – New Untitled Radiohead Song (live soundcheck)
All in all I had a wonderful time in Los Angeles and even though I’ve seen the band a lot, they still manage to impress and surprise me with every show they play. So thanks to the band for that. Now finish the damn album.
