10/28/00 - Saturday, Michigan Theater - Ann Arbor, MI

https://archive.org/details/db2000-10-28AKG.flac16

Image: The interior of the Michigan Theater (source: twitter.com)

Review:

Jigsaw Earth has a short trancey jam before the first chase section. It’s not fleshed out by any means, but here it is nearly three minutes long, and it’s pretty good. The main jam has an eerie atmosphere and a driving rhythm, but overall it feels kind of thin. Around the 13 minute mark the rhythm changes up, becoming vaguely dubby. The jam melts into a Hope intro. The Hope jam is blissful and very Barber-led. It builds to a cool peak, but overall is a pretty average Hope. Plan B is an excellent and inventive version. The first jam is standard, but they blow the second one wide open. Sammy lays down a trance beat, and by the six minute mark the band locks into a tense trance theme. It enters familiar Jigsaw territory pretty quickly, but spends a good amount of time exploring that space before it finally lands in the song. The band doesn’t build up to a crescendo before Barber drops the chase riff again, making for a sudden and somewhat jarring transition. There is a relatively short trance theme after this chase section, which builds up to a much more satisfying drop into the third chase. The next jam is mellow dub, with some infectious flute synth lines from Magner and playful Barber riffs that build to the Jigsaw ending. Jigsaw has an outro jam based around the intro riff, which creeps pretty steadily and smoothly back into Plan B. Plan B has an outro jam of its own. It quickly departs the structure of the song itself and launches into a driving trance theme (sounding a lot like a Run Like Hell intro). There is a tense breakdown around the 5 minute mark, and the jam heads towards Helicopters. Magner’s synth choices remind me of the 10/21 version. The jam builds up to a glorious Helicopters peak.

The Unspoken Rhyme is another excellent version. It’s very patient and Barber-led, unlike the recent version from 10/21/00 which was considerably more aggressive and Magner-dominated. Magner moves to the trance synths around the 9 minute mark and the jam builds to a beautiful peak. Crickets follows, the first to be played since the definitive 10/13 version. It begins very mellow, with that feather-light trance beat that was so characteristic of the Crickets jams of the time. Around 4:30 Magner begins to introduce and build on a distinctive synth line. Barber begins to take the reins around 6:30 and builds up to the peak. A solid first jam but on the shorter side. The funk jam is even shorter. It’s pretty groovy, and features very tasteful Gates of Hell usage. Another short Widow in the Rain, without any jam to speak of, melts into a Magellan intro. It’s not terribly interesting setlisting, but the Magellan jam is as exploratory as you could hope for a type one version to be. Excellent spacey atmosphere from Magner in the first half and a glorious build to the peak. Confrontation is another mellow version, like the recent 10/26 version, and builds to a satisfying peak. M.E.M.P.H.I.S. in the encore slot is a solid choice, especially after a fairly restrained second set. The first jam is excellent; it’s short, but it packs a wallop. It begins in typical M.E.M.P.H.I.S. fashion but quickly builds up to a furious peak. In the M.E.M.P.H.I.S. outro jam, Magner lays down a catchy trance theme right away. It creates a cool, groovy effect here, but pretty soon the rhythm section starts to develop a trance beat, and Magner adapts his theme to a brain-bending trance jam. The theme breaks down slightly around the 14 minute mark, and from here begins to build into a traditional Run Like Hell jam with a thrilling peak.

Overall a very subdued show, particularly surprising given that it was a Saturday night after a run of thrilling shows leading up. The encore is the most exciting part, but there are highlights interspersed throughout.

Highlights:

M.E.M.P.H.I.S. > Run Like Hell

A simple and effective jam, a journey from the M.E.M.P.H.I.S. outro groove through an excellent passage of fall 2000 trance that culminates in a fiery Run Like Hell peak.

Plan B > Helicopters

The jam pretty much immediately departs Plan B (likely why it is tracked separately) but it doesn’t give itself away as a Helicopters jam for several minutes.

Plan B > Jigsaw Earth

Definitely the more experimental half of the sandwich, which earns it points over the much tighter Jigsaw > Plan B. It escapes from strict Plan B confines and explores a tense trance passage that doesn’t so much peak as much as it lands in Jigsaw Earth.

Unspoken Rhyme

I don’t think it tops 10/21, but it’s worthy of consideration, and different enough that it could make the question interesting.

Stray Observations:

The sound quality on this show is not great. The drums in particular sound very boomy, and there are a few noticeable volume fluctuations.

This is the first Crickets since 10/13/00, a gap of 10 shows. Considering how solid that Crickets is, and how new the song is, that is a remarkable gap.