Well, now that the dust has settled over Southern California, I can reflect on the musical monsoon that rolled through here. Chicago’s own, Umphrey’s McGee, rolled into San Diego last Thursday night kicking off two nights (San Diego and LA) in Southern California before moving on to NorCal. Like the seasons, you can set your watch by UM’s tour schedule. They always roll through here around St. Patrick’s Day. And, as they have the last 3-4 years, they rolled into So. Cal with heavy rock vibes on their mind. I’ve seen UM many times and they’ve delivered everything from a jazzy version to an all out metal melee version of themselves. Seems like SoCal brings out the heavy rockin’ version of this band.
They came out of the gate strong with a combination of punches which included You Got the Wrong Guy>Little Gift>Ocean Billy>2nd Self. BAM BAM BAM. For the uninitiated, you’ve just been sent through a musical gauntlet. Settling down for a few tunes they danced us around the room with a Passing>Dump City followed by Mad Love and capping it all off nicely with The Linear back into the end of Ocean Billy. Start strong, end strong.
Second set calmed down a little bit and introduced the SD audience to the band’s more psychedelic side. Phil’s Farm>The Floor, Conduit, Out of Order>The Fussy Dutchman kicked it off. Then they welcomed out a special guest. Mike Keneally on guitar. To say Keneally has been around would be an understatement. He’s played with many many people including the late, great, Frank Zappa. Keneally sat in for a Wappy Sprayberry, which was very tasty indeed, which led into the Rolling Stones cover “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” to close out the set. All that was needed was an All in Time encore to punctuate that sentence and it was a great night of music.
Add to all of the above the great light work from Jefferson Waful and all in all, a great night in San Diego!
03.05.2015 House of Blues, San Diego, CA, USA
Set 1: You Got the Wrong Guy > Little Gift > Ocean Billy > 2nd Self, Passing > Dump City, Mad Love, The Linear > Ocean Billy
Set 2: Phil’s Farm > The Floor, Conduit, Out Of Order > The Fussy Dutchman, Wappy Sprayberry[1] > Can’t You Hear Me Knocking[1]
Encore: All In Time
