I’m sure I’ve expressed this before, but sometimes I feel like I do an inadequate job with these recaps in terms of giving a sense of what a show is really like. How could my take represent what the average person who attended the show took away from it, especially someone like this Redditor who was seeing Wilco for the first time. I can’t — or am scared to — even think back to what my first show was like. I’m sure I sang along too loudly and annoyed someone standing near me. (Um, maybe things haven’t changed all that much.)
Of course I realize everyone at a given show has their perspective and is coming to it from a unique place, and in the end, I’m writing these pieces for myself (and with a handful of other nerds in mind) as I always have, and if anyone else gets anything out of them, then all the better. Still, occasionally I can’t help feeling like someone who went to a show and reads something I wrote might walk away thinking, “What the heck is he even talking about?” or “He barely mentions the music,” or “I just wanted to know how the show was, dummy.”
That’s particularly true in a city like London, which obviously already features a very diverse mix of people. Just in my immediate vicinity tonight at the Eventim (née HMV, Carling, Labatt’s, Hammersmith) Apollo, it seemed like there were folks from different parts of the U.K., as well as both the U.S. and Europe and probably even further away — some who came here to work or study and others who took a holiday to come to see Jeff and Co. The age range also seemed wider than at a lot of other Wilco shows these days, including more than a few on the younger end — though, interestingly, not as many actual kids as you often see in the U.S.
(Incidentally, I happened to see Go-Go’s drummer Kathy Valentine post on her Instagram and Substack about getting to hang out with the band. Apparently she is friendly with guitar tech Jeff Tweedy and maybe a little with actual Jeff Tweedy as well. As many times as I can write about #TwoTweedys here, I intend to. This being London, I’m sure there were at least a few other musicians in the house as well. I remember a widely circulated photo of Nels smooching old friend Thurston Moore after last summer’s show at the Royal Albert Hall that somehow got picked up by Parade.com of all places — yes, the Parade that used to come in a lot of Sunday newspapers in the U.S., which is hardly a bastion of indie rock goings-on, as far as I know.)
Jeff alluded to that marquee RAH gig in one of his most noteworthy visits to Banter Corner tonight at the Apollo. “We’re having a fucking blast,” he said about halfway through the set, before adding, “I can’t remember the name of the dump we played last time, but this is cooler.” The RAH certainly is a picturesque and legendary venue, but in my opinion, the 5,000-capacity Apollo had a better atmosphere to properly experience a Wilco performance. This was the third time the band has played here, following gigs in 2005 and 2019, and though I can’t quite identify another venue it reminded me of at the moment, it was a good place to feel a connection with the band, at least if you were close, because of its relatively low, three-foot stage. I don’t think the show completely sold out, but it seemed pretty full, both in the seated balcony and on the standing room-only floor that gently slopes down to the stage.
Though Jeff had declared early on that “there’s a fair number of things we’d like to accomplish tonight, so I’m not gonna talk that much,” it wasn’t as if he completely clammed up for the rest of the show. (Amusingly, right after he said that, someone apparently said, “Yay,” and Jeff smiled and replied, “Yay? I heard that.”) At any rate, he didn’t chat a ton, but he did respond to an “I love you, Jeff!” with a pretty funny look of mock resignation on his face. “I know,” Jeff said. “I say I love you to my wife sometimes and she says, ‘OK.’”
Other brief quips by Jeff included joking at one point that the security guards up front handing out clear plastic cups of water were actually distributing shots of tequila, and that “tonight is flying by, man” after Theologians. And when the main set really was heading toward its inevitable conclusion, Jeff deployed one of his patented lines — “We’re getting pretty close to the end. I just mean in general,” — that works every time.
I was interested to see how, and in what way(s), the Apollo setlist might vary from the RAH one since the two shows were only about 14 months apart. By my count, 12 of the 23 songs played at the RAH were also played at the Apollo. Sadly neither show featured the rearranged Kingpin, but especially at the latter since Jeff and Co. had made it such a prominent part of their American sets this year. Aside from the obvious “livin’ in…London” missed lyric change opportunity, I empathize with the fans on this side of the pond who haven’t gotten to experience that one live. I mean, it’s not too late yet and there’s at least a chance it gets played sometime during next week’s two-night stand in Antwerp, Belgium, but it doesn’t seem like there’s the time and/or the inclination by the band to include it in most of the shows over here.
The news wasn’t all bad as far as setlist surprises, however. After playing the electric arrangement of Art Of Almost at the previous show in Amsterdam for the first time in a long time in Europe, it made another appearance tonight (and was received just as well, I think). Theologians — complete with the always-fun “big riff” ending — also made a reappearance after somewhat surprisingly not having been performed on this side of the Atlantic since one of the Iceland shows in 2023. And while I’m burying the lede here, I would suggest the real eye-opener came at the start of the encore with the return of Ashes Of American Flags after a couple of years.
It wasn’t so much that Ashes hadn’t been played in a little while, but how it was played that was noteworthy. Usually it slowly builds up to a soaring Nels solo, as heard on the Kicking Television live album, but that never came tonight. Instead, after Jeff literally saluted as he delivered the final verse, the focus turned to Glenn and his use of a handheld electric drill to end the song on a uniquely drone-y note. I can’t recall Ashes having been played live that way before — was there a demo or outtake on the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot box set with something resembling that arrangement? — and I thought for a second that maybe the band would somehow segue into Less Than You Think. After all, that’s the Wilco song (which was played at the RAH last year, for what it’s worth) known for the use of a drill. But instead of going even further off into that more avant-garde realm, which would have been something, things returned to more conventional rockage with the feel-good energy provided by the concluding I Got You (At The End Of The Century) and Outtasite (Outta Mind).
They say you can’t be everything to everyone, and that’s certainly true, but I have to give Jeff and Co. credit for pretty deftly toeing that line during their 1-hour, 51-minute set. From the diehards who’ve seen the band dozens of times to the casual fan who is most excited to hear Impossible Germany to the first-timer who is just happy to be there, I don’t think too many people walked out of that venerable venue regretting having come to the show. And that’s an achievement in and of itself for a group that has played here relatively often over the years.
Here was the complete setlist, as played, at the Apollo (there were no changes from the printed setlist):
Handshake Drugs
If I Ever Was A Child
Via Chicago
I Am Trying To Break Your Heart>
Kamera
Evicted
Bird Without A Tail/Base Of My Skull
I’m Always In Love (acoustic arrangement)
Everyone Hides
Annihilation
Hummingbird
It’s Just That Simple
Theologians
Impossible Germany
Art Of Almost
Jesus, etc.
Heavy Metal Drummer>
I’m The Man Who Loves You
Encore
Ashes Of American Flags
California Stars
I Got You (At The End Of The Century)>
Outtasite (Outta Mind)
I want your travel schedule! Seeing Wilco in such cool venues and cities.
Hearing Ashes played like that had to have sounded amazing. Hope they keep that up!