May 03, 2006

Helix to open the show is solid. Not great, not bad. Hope has a neat little “gentle nature” jam, which I always enjoy. This is not a standout by any means, but I like the effort. The Robots jam is the typical 90 BPM-ish jam. This is pretty noodly to me, and just never feels like they were doing anything other than treading water here. The Sven jam here was just boring to me. Never felt like this even piqued my interest a little bit.

Memphis first jam is noodly Barber at his worst, and this is just flat out boring. Second jam at least is a little more cohesive, but still not all that interesting. The last Robots jam, I’m pretty sure Magner is saying “Leroy Jenkins” in the vocoder, but can’t totally confirm. The jam itself is actually not bad, and features some neat interplay between Brownstein and Barber. Barber’s riff sounds a lot like “This is Halloween,” but I don’t think this is intentional so much as coincidental. They absolutely botch the ending somehow, however. Home Again is the typical type 1 jam. Meh. This Dribble is bizarre. Magner is off by like two lines on the lyrics, and it’s clear the band is just either very intoxicated, or just doesn’t care here. Either way is awful. The jam here is sloppy, as is the return to the composed portion. Jesus. I have to wonder if at portions of this, Allen wonders to himself, “What did I get myself into?” The second Dribble jam is much better. The band (Barber) at least gets on the same page here, and they develop a really nice groove. This is nothing groundbreaking, but after the last half-hour of garbage, I feel like this is a breath of fresh air. The RLH jam has a very nice groove to it, but beyond that there’s not much here. Same goes for second RLH jam. Meh city. I Remember Ray is just absolutely terrible. The worst.

Highlights: Robots (2), Dribble (2)