Nearly Home

October 17, 2009 - Schaeffer Auditorium - Kutztown University - Kutztown, PA

Two shows today including the last rock show of the trip. This write-up is pretty short because my memory is shot. We drove in from Pittsburgh in the morning and since we were camping the last night I wanted to get our tent set up before going to the shows so we wouldn't be setting up in the dark. Our campground was in the middle of nowhere and I didn't time things well. As such, we got to Kutztown University with only minutes to spare and the only reason we didn't miss the beginning of the show was that they started a few minutes late. Never thought I would say this, but thank goodness it was an assigned seat show or we would have been all the way in the back. The band was coming on as we were finding our seats. This was a bit of a production as the family next to us had sat one seat too far to the right and had to move down. Of course we felt a little silly about making them move when we abandoned our seats for the stage after the first song.

Setlist: I Never Go To Work - Clap Your Hands - Famous Polka - Paleontologist - WDTSS - Pirate Girls Nine - Bed - Roy G. Biv - Alphabet Lost and Found - Fibber Island - Zilch - Shooting Star - My Brother the Ape - Alphabet of Nations - Older - Where Do They Make Balloons? - Seven - Doctor Worm  Encore - Meet the Elements - Istanbul

The family show was very similar to the Chicago, Madison and AMNH shows. The setlist was pretty much the same and even several of the bits of banter were repeated.

We were next to the speaker on the left side of the stage for all but the first song and the mix of sound coming out of the speaker was not evenly distributed for the first few songs. I could very clearly hear every accordion note from the Famous Polka but could barely hear the guitar. On that song it was actually kind of cool, almost like hearing the accordion part on it's own. It did get evened out eventually, either that or I got used to it.

There was a row of speakers in front of the stage and initially the kids were lined up behind them but it didn't take too long before they climbed on top of them. The kids got really bold and were leaning on to the stage and eventually there were a few actually sitting on the front of the stage. There was a big carved wood ledge around the stage that they were perched on. The band didn't seem to care. In fact, I think they loved it. All the guys were in such a happy, silly mood, probably because they were so close to home.

When Linnell went to pick up his accordion for the first time he discovered that the cord had been wrapped into the canvas that goes around the bottom of the platform at the back of the stage. He held it out to show Dan who thought it was kind of funny (so did Linnell I think) and then had to pull enough cord out to be able to take it to the front of the stage.

Linnell has started playing around with the dinosaurs he uses for Paleontologist on this tour. I don't know dinosaurs well enough to remember all the ones he has used but by the time he got to this show he wasn't using any of the ones from the recording. Trilobite has been a favorite. At one of the last shows, I think it was this one, he followed it with something like "what are those things anyway?"

For WDTSS the nuclear reactions were caused by penicillin, erythromycin, vancomycin (not positive about this one) and over the counter cold medicine. After the songs he told the kids that he was making it up and all the stuff about the antibiotics wasn't true.

Before Bed, Bed, Bed, Linnell said that they had been on tour all week and he hadn't slept in six days so he was going to bed. Then he pretended he was getting a message through his ear monitor telling him that he couldn't go to bed yet so decided to sing about going to bed instead.

One of the noise makers Marty uses for Bed is a round bicycle style horn. After he put it down, Flans walked over behind him and started honking it behind Marty's back in one of the sections of the song that doesn't have sound effects. Then a minute later Flans walked back over and picked up the horn again and hung it over the neck of his guitar to take it back to his mic to honk at the end of the song. Oh, you can tell these guys are getting loopy as they reach the end of this trip. I love it!

The puppets mostly focused on their fake Avatars album and the coffee cup hat. At the end of Shooting Star after the ad-libbing about Earth not answering the meteor's call, Flans made an explosion sound as the meteor hit ground.

They had the confetti blizzard set up at the back of the room again and Flans attempted to give the operator a warning signal in Older but it was misinterpreted and the blizzard started too early. It made for an awkward moment later in the song when the canon was supposed to go off and there wasn't much confetti left to blow. It was funny but kind of spoiled the impact of the confetti. I don't think the kids cared.

Before starting Balloons, Danny said "I don't know what you guys put in the water around here but you sure have some cute kids." By this point there were several seated on the edge of the stage and tons perched on the speakers and I think Danny was having fun watching them boogie and play with the confetti.

Flans started to do one of the "We Want Cake" cries at the wrong point in Seven, making everyone laugh and making me start to do it at the wrong time too. Doh!

That is pretty much all I remember from the family show that wasn't repeated from another show. It was a really fun show despite my brief description.

We wandered downtown between shows in search of Chinese food. Kutztown is the epitome of a small college town. Lots of bars, lots of pizza, lots of college students. The rock show was listed as starting at 7:30 instead of 8:00. TMBG still didn't go on until 9:00 but the upshot was that Guggenheim went on early and got to do a longer set than usual. I particularly appreciated this since this was their last show of the tour for me. They did the new song Wisdom, plus a song I hadn't heard before and their second ukulele song that they had dropped from the set when they started doing Wisdom. I'm gonna miss these guys. I hope they tour with TMBG again sometime. Ironically, I discovered yesterday that they were playing in Cambridge last night, only a half hour from me, at a club I have been to numerous times but I had to work. I can manage to see them halfway across the country but not 20 miles from home. Oh well.

The TMBG setlist: Meet the Elements - New York City - Ana Ng - My Brother the Ape - Twisting - Doctor Worm - Birdhouse - Clap Your Hands - Where Your Eyes Don't Go - Seven - Hearing Aid - Polk - Science Is Real - Paleontologist - Dead - Spider - Don't Let's Start - Shooting Star - Shoehorn - Cowtown - Istanbul  Encore - We Live in a Dump - Mesopotamians  Encore 2 - Drink - Alphabet of Nations - Damn Good Times

I am afraid in all the shows I went to in the last few weeks my brain has overloaded and I remember hardly any specifics of this one. If any more of it comes back to me later I'll add some post scripts. There was a woman standing next to me who was singing so loudly and so badly throughout the entire show that at times I was very tempted to turn around and tell her to shut up. Why do people not understand? If the people around you can hear you "singing" over the sound of the blasting rock band, you are too loud! I was thrilled when they started We Live In A Dump and she didn't know the words. Hurrah!

There was more confetti canon trouble. There was no one manning the blizzard canon during Istanbul so it couldn't be set off. Flans cut the song short without doing the second ending, I think because he was annoyed. When they went to set it off during Damn Good Times not only was there someone to operate it, Scott also appeared as a back-up. Me thinks, perhaps, some words were exchanged backstage before the encore.

There was a girl on the opposite side of the stage from me who yelled at Flans at the beginning of the show that this was her 30th show. Flans said something back to her about the previous 29 but I didn't hear what he said. She got thanked at the end when Flans was picking out some audience members to thank, along with a guy wearing a 13 t-shirt whom Flans also told "no flash photography."

Somewhere in the middle of the week, as Shooting Star began during the puppet segment, Flans-puppet started saying "Let's stare at Dan Miller as he plays" and both puppets would stare at Dan while he began the song. They did this several times and we always made a point of staring fixedly at Dan too. This was particularly easy tonight as he was standing right in front of us and I think we managed to get several other people to join in. I wonder if he noticed at all?

When Flans went to pick up his acoustic guitar at one point the cord got caught on something and he said "that's not good." They managed to free it though. They were definitely having cord troubles today. At least it wasn't as bad as the show earlier in the week where the cord for the acoustic fell out of the guitar part way through a song.

To make up for my lack of a good recap I do have one good story from the middle of the show. I actually will do an exact transcription of it from some video I recorded (there isn't actually any visual worth seeing, I just did it to get the audio). This isn't a new story but I thought it was a funnier version.

Before my video starts Linnell asked Flans if they should tell the story about the band that must not be named. He agreed. Linnell explained that this happened in a town not too far from where we were.

I should also clarify that whenever Flans was referring to TMBG in the first bit of the story as a nameless band,  Linnell was either pointing at himself or mouthing "US" off to the side.

Flans: "So anyway, a band was doing a show opening for another band. The band that was opening, *whispering* US, we were used to doing, you know, headlining our own shows so it was still a bit difficult opening for another, much bigger band. And, ah, we did a really good job and really got the crowd going. We played like a half hour and you know, people were screaming and it was great and everyone was dancing around just like we were like high fives. It was awesome. And ah, that band got off the stage and ah, the next band came on the stage and their like, we were talking to those guys with They Might Be Giants. They said you guys sucked."

Crowd: Ooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Linnell: "Exactly"

Flans: "Now in show business, this is known as dropping an atomic bomb on the opener. I don't think we were invited back to that area.."

Linnell: "We should clarify that the opening band, insert They Might Be Giants name, didn't actually think the audience sucked and didn't express that view so this was a complete confection of the other band."

Flans: "By confection, John is not talking about delicious candy."

Crowd: Laughter

Linnell: "It was a confabulation, to put it in contemporary terms. It was a confabulation that they cooked up."

Flans: "It was a giant confabulation of baloney sandwiches they doled out in adult portions, much to the shock and amazement of They Might Be Giants. So um, last last year I was in.."

Linnell: "This story has a really funny ending, by the way."

Flans: "A really funny ending where the next song starts."

Linnell: "The story ends."

Flans: "And the story ends, that's like.."

Linnell: "Wow, I'm glad that story's over."

Flans: "But I was actually.."

Linnell: "It was awesome."

Flans: "I was in Lancaster, PA last year (crowd cheers), please hold your applause while I tell you that I was in a vinyl record store, the only vinyl record store in Pennsylvania I might add."

30th show girl: "We saw you walking there."

Flans: "And ah, you saw me walking there. And the guy who owns the shop was like, do you guys hate Lancaster? (crowd laughs) And I realized that this story has gone on. So, we just want to say, we're fine with Lancaster *something unintelligible* and we enjoyed performing for everyone here as well. So um, anyway, thats the true story portion of the show ladies and gentlemen."

Linnell: "Thank you very much. Goodnight. *pause* We're back."

I should add that I was also at the show before which 30th show girl saw Flans walking to the record store. It was actually the show where I first heard the story but this version was better. I know I looked before to try and figure out who the band was TMBG was opening for but I don't remember what I had decided. Some further research has given me a couple of possibilities. I'll let you do your own research if you are curious. Feel free to comment if you know the answer.

Anyway, this was a really excellent show. The guys were all smiles. All the banter I don't remember was funny. I got totally coated with the tiny invasive confetti during Damn Good Times. We got setlists at both shows. By this point the guitar tech, Victor, recognized my boyfriend and was really nice about making sure he got one. We hung around for a bit after the show trying to see if we could find one of the Dans to sign our CD. We had just about given up when Dan Miller walked through and my boyfriend tried to catch him but he moved too fast. Meanwhile, Danny had snuck past me and was standing right behind me signing for some other fans. Once I clued my boyfriend in to the fact that it was Danny that he had just had to sneak behind to get back to me, he very graciously signed our CD and drew little balloons on it. I wish I hadn't been too nervous to say something to him besides thank you, because I really wanted to tell him how much I love Paleontologist. Oh, well. Maybe another time. Only one more Dan signature needed! Only one more show to go as well. I'll try to get the last write-up done tomorrow and add all the pictures in to the appropriate entries. Many of them are already of Flickr.

Side note: On our way back to our campsite, my GPS took us on the most backwoods, middle of nowhere route. It had sent us on three major state routes to get there and then, inexplicably on the way back, decided to send us into horror movie territory. There was a dirt road at one point. And lots of wheat. I was expecting zombies or a guy with a chainsaw to suddenly appear. Very odd. Just thought I'd share.

Post Script: I can't believe I forgot this, but I was reminded while standing in the grocery store line today glancing at the tabloids. During a break between songs at the rock show the Johns decided they needed to do some more talking so Flansburgh said "how about that Bubble Boy?" They went off on this whole thing about the "Bubble Boy"and Linnell said he didn't know about anyone else but he probably would have gotten in the bubble. Flans made several comments that I don't remember, but the whole time I had no idea what they were talking about and I could tell a lot of the crowd didn't either. I wasn't sure if I had just missed something by being out of touch with the world for a week or if they were just making an obscure reference. Then they started the next song and part way through the song Linnell suddenly said "I think he's actually called Balloon Boy." Ohhhhh! I get it now! They were talking about that stupid kid in the balloon. I love that Linnell realized they had the name wrong while he was singing and just decided to continue the conversation in the middle of the song.