The Loud Family Tour 1998:

From: Michael J. Zwirn
Subject: [loud-fans] I Used to Go Out With Linda Tripp -- DC Concert Notes

No comments on the DC show yet? I imagine some of the attendees are too haggard from returning home at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning to have coherent thoughts yet ... (I fit into that category as well, but I'll scribble a few things nonetheless.)

The DCCD in-store show was attended, err, sparsely. Perhaps twenty people in the store including the band and the store employees, and maybe ten people were there to see the band. The set-list was short - five actual songs and two of the interstitial bits from Days for Days. They did "Dee-Pression" and "Crypto-Sicko," plus two other DfD pieces, and the surprise for me was "Asleep and Awake on the Man's Freeway." Perhaps twenty minutes total, and unfortunately people were arriving to see the band as they were finishing. Their haul, tapewise, was really good - someone gave them the Robert Johnson box on cassette, the Jam box dubbed, and Doug and I had some various mix tapes. I thought they sounded good, even in the less-than-stellar sound at the store, and I was surprised by how much Alison holds the sound together on keyboards (and that Gil fella, wow can he drum).

After the usual hassles moving equipment out the door, etc., the band drove off to the Metro Cafe. I walked over later, just avoiding the torrential downpour that appeared out of nowhere and completely obliterated the sweltering humidity that had prevailed up that point in the day. The subsequent rainbow was spectacular, as Scott later noted on stage. The folks from Neilsen Hubbard (It's a band, and a guy -- they contain multitudes) boggled at the weather, as did Gil, who observed that lightning doesn't strike in San Francisco.

The Metro didn't let the first band, NUMBer, on-stage until 9:45 or so. It was going to be a long evening, and NUMBer weren't making it any shorter. Their set illustrated a marked proclivity toward drugguy lyrics and loud, somewhat pointless Futzing About With Guitars (FAWGs). Playing with flashlights, screwdrivers, etc. I thought the drummer was OK. Neilsen Hubbard was a lot better - Neilsen himself has a great falsetto, and I liked their set quite a bit.

By the time the Loud Family came on stage, it was around time for carriages to be turning into pumpkins, and I was already getting sleepy - not a good thing. The crowd was somewhere between forty-sixty, but very knowledgable, and people were regaling Scott with stories of seeing their first Game Theory gig in 1985, or whenever. I saw people singing along, although even the ones who clearly knew all the songs were a bit diffident at times. The crowd reaction was move energetic when - bizarrely - the manager tried to get the Louds off the stage without an encore, much to everyone's dismay. Crowd reaction forced his hand, and they came back for two more songs. Some of the highlights -- "Sword Swallower," "Dee-Pression," "Where They Go Back to School," "Not Because You Can" (!) and the two covers, which were intriguing choices. I thought they sounded great throughout - Alison is great, and entertaining on stage, Gil is a very inventive drummer, Scott's singing was really quite good, and Kenny was a rock on the bass. People who's seen them before concur that this is a great live line-up. They rock, and on and off-stage, they're about the most charming, self-deprecating, sincere folks you're likely to run across. Ironically, if they were your neighbors, they'd be the exact opposite of an actual loud family - they'd invite you over for vegetarian barbecue, make sure they weren't playing the stereo too loud, and walk your mail over if it went to wrong address. Great folks (not that I'm surprised).

Michael

From: Joel Maupin
Subject: [loud-fans] LF in DC: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (medium long, no spoilers)

Went to the DC show yesterday. Not going to give a rundown, as I am a bit tired from last night's festivities, but a few select observations:

1. The Good: Meeting Scott, though ever so briefly. He is an intelligent, friendly and patient man. Alison is much more perky than he CD would suggest. Gil and I talked briefly but slowly, being fellow recovering southerners. Kenny was TCB, so I didn't meet him. The thing about meeting a band or songwriter I admire is that I really don't have much to say except to gush about how I've admired them for years, etc. Something about that really brings out the dork in me.

2. The Bad: I missed the in-store due to traffic. Doh! Did get to dump off some road tapes to the band. I feel for them on that level. I have to have fresh music for road tripping.

3. The Ugly: I absolutely seethe at the attitudes of a lot of the people employed in facilitating music performances. The sound at the DC gig was the usual rent-a-PA with sound guy. It was horrible. When the Louds were trying to do an encore, they couldn't because somebody, either the club manager or the sound guy, was saying no. After much cheering and pleading, whomever was being the stick in the mud relented. Scott stepped up to the mike and said "Ah, the P.A.'s up." The sound guy, not audible to Scott, but to anybody within 10 feet of him said "It was always up, asshole". This was the same sound guy who spent most of the Louds performance on his cell phone. I don't know how someone can manage to be jaded and ignorant at the same time, but he did. I hope he's not somebody's cousin out there, but in case he is, I'll just say he is a different type of person than what I like. Why do these people have to act like hard-bitten carny types? Can't people who do this type of work have more respect for the artists? Much hand wringing, I know. Oh well, maybe I'm just tired and gripy.

The evening's most funny/embarrassing moment:

I brought four friends with me, one who is a big fan of Scott, one who is somewhat familiar with the Loud Family, and two that had never heard them. There were three bands playing that night, we had thought there were only going to be two. One of my two friends who didn't know the LF leaned over and asked "Is this one from the new album?" thinking that Neilson Hubbard was the LF. NH were playing an extremely quiet song, I mean you could hear a pin drop! Scott was sitting a few feet behind where we were standing. I was faced with saying "No, this isn't the Loud Family, it's Neilson Hubbard" where Scott could hear me. Perish the thought! So I made a bunch of retarded gestures at him trying to get my friend to come over out of earshot so I could explain to him what was what. But he just stood there looking at me as if I was making a bunch of retarded gestures at him. I finally got to whisper to him the necessary info, then my other non-LF-knowing friend pipes in, at full volume "You mean this isn't the Loud Family?..." The upshot is that both of my non-LF-knowing friends are now LF-knowing friends, and they liked them enough to buy CDs after the show.

It was a really good show (too short, though!), despite the sound thing, and the crowd was definitely appreciative enough, though only about 50 or so were there. But hey, they hit the stage at midnight on Tuesday, in a town where day jobs are taken way too seriously anyway, so IMHO, they did good.

Gotta cop me some zzzzs

Joel Maupin

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