SlipLive

Brad's solo set was no doubt the highlight for me last night - too bad it was very brief at only 30-40 minutes. I could have used another set of Brad without a doubt. He was quite talkative, telling the story of "sarah through the wall" - in addition to 'ooh belle', 'bouba's bounce'. Sadly I didn't take a setlist, but I bet that Harry has it. His voice sounded nice, and his guitar playing is top-notch. Definitely still playing around with new effects, spending quite a bit of time with the strings tied to the base of his classical guitar strings (and later on his electric) - all the while manipulating sounds with his feet.

Even got to meet another slipliver last night - soraparuq. Nice hanging outside for a bit!

We went and got some tea during the 2nd groups set after a few songs - and then made it back for the Sonya Kitchell set. Some of her songs are quite good, some are quite cheesy - but she is only 19, so I'd imagine that she can only get better right? Her voice is unbelievable, but sometimes overdone (too much breathy vocal work) and over the top. Worth the price of admission however. They played The Soft Machine which was really nice - but not stretched out really. They'd often get to places where it really could have been a launching pad for a jam - but that never quite happened. Sonya's got a good stage presence, and BAM seemed to enjoy playing with her - quite a bit of onstage chemistry.

A few photos...

Yeah, it was a fun night! Brad's opening set was quite good though it could have easily been twice as long for my tastes. Dave Brogan (drums for ALO) then played a set fronting a band (while playing guitar and singing) which included Hoops from Big Light. Fun soulful ALO type stuff. Then Sonya and The Slip were up. It was a fun show, about an hour and a half with mostly tracks from her new album along with as mentioned The Soft Machine and Highway 61 (encore.)

As lumpy says there wasn't a lot of jamming though there were some tunes with some nice Slip-style playing. I really don't know her material that well and some of it I liked quite a bit better than other parts. All in all a good set though if you came there for The Slip and didn't know what you were in for I could see it being rather disappointing. All in all I had quite a good time!

I pulled a SBD/Mics-in-balcony matrix. I'm not sure if I'll be able to distribute it as I talked to Andrew and Sonya before the show to get permission and she is going to have to clear it first but I should be able to get Brad's set up at some point.

Definitely a fun night! At first I wasn’t too keen on hearing The Slip play an evening’s worth of someone else’s songs, but once they go into it, I really dug it. Lots of the songs were very Slip-ish in their sound and feel. It was fun to watch BAM embellish with their own personal flare when they thought it was appropriate. A lot of the songs probably would have been a bit flat with any other back-up band. And it a way, it was refreshing getting to hear a bunch of new material from the boys (even if it wasn’t theirs).

Soyna did have pretty good stage presence, but she’s still a bit “green”. Not too bad though. One thing that did bug me was that she always seemed to feel the need to get in Brad’s face when he was soloing. A couple times it was appropriate and it worked. The rest of the time, though, I was just annoyed by it. I kept wishing she’d back off. In fact, when he jumped up on the speaker and played a solo up there, I could just imagine him thinking “Finally I can play a solo in peace.”

Her voice, I thought, was top-notch. I don’t normally go for over-the-top, breathy vocal work (as Lumpy put it) but man, she had me sucked in last night.

Other random thoughts…..
It was fun watching Marc on the keys.
There were a lot of Sonya fans around me. Most had never head of The Slip. That was not quite what I was expecting, since I myself had never heard of Sonya before this tour was announced. Her fans did seem quite impressed with her band, though.

All in all, a great time! Definitely glad I went.

Yes, Sonya did get in Brad's face a lot but he seemed to play off it just fine. She also tried with Marc but he was a bit more steadfast and not into it as much.

The Slip are definitely doing her a favor. The Independent was pretty empty. The Slip alone could easily sell out 1 night or fill 2 nights a lot more. There were a number of Sonya fans there for sure but on a Friday night I am sure The Slip alone would have pulled a bigger crowd. Dave Brogan also brings the ALO crowd as well though there is quite a bit of overlap there with the SF Slip crew.

I listened to Brad's solo set today. The SBD mix for the first couple tunes is pretty weird though it settles in to something pretty nice sounding a few tunes in. It also sounds like there were some talkers into my balcony mics at a couple points. I wanted to run onstage but with 3 acts the sound guy was pretty frazzled and I took off to go to dinner as well so that didn't happen.

Thinking about the Sonya/Slip set it was a bit like keeping a Tiger on a leash.

i'm pretty surprised they decided to play Soft Machine on this tour instead of More About Me, sonya would kill on that