Aye, a wee postcard from the working vacation mode— I flew over to London in time to see Peter Buck playing on his tour with Luke Haines as they celebrate their new album with two weeks of dates around the UK . A packed club south of the river with lots of friends, family and rock royalty there, all good fun including the opener, the Minus Five!
The next night was the final show of A Moon for the Misbegotten starring Michael Shannon and Ruth Wilson— cool Theatre, the Almeida up north in Islington, and a stirring performance by the actors along with incredible staging and sound design. I don’t see nearly enough plays, but this one made me wish I did so more often.
And then last night, Michael Shannon was back in action in his rock mode with Jason Narducy and the cast of friends* who’ve been occasionally barnstorming different early R.E.M. albums around the US and now across the ocean. Last night was at the venerable Glasgow venue The Garage, packed out to the hilt, crowd singing along on most of the words, and after two hours of those wonderful songs, everybody went home happy, satiated and joyful.
*In addition to Jon Wurster on drums, Dag Juhlin and Vijay Tellis-Nayak on keys, this version of the combo includes the estimable Ted Leo on bass— and they sound great together on those key core songs of the early canon.
I got some real chillbumps on a couple of the songs— maybe not “all the feels,” but a whole lot of them!
-BERTIS
Main Photos: L-R Jon Wurster, Dag Juhlin, Ted Leo, Michael Shannon, Jason Narducy, Vijay Tellis-Nayak
Photos: Bertis
