Tom Stoodley noted in response to Kevin Fredette's observation:
> > Maybe Tweedy's getting road burnout, but for most of the evening, he
> > looked like he'd rather be almost anywhere but onstage. I know life on
> > tour can be a drag, but am I expecting too much when I think a performer
> > should at least try to look like they're having a good time?
>
> He did look pretty tired. I'm willing to write that off as a by-product
> of the strange zigzags the East Coast swing is taking, which necessitate a
> lot more road time than might otherwise be necessary.
Joe Gracey replied:
> I can't recall one time in my life when the road hassles spilled over
> onto our stage performance. After all, that's where it all becomes
> worthwhile. I'd say it sounds more like Tweedy just doesn't like to
> perform much, or he'd snap out of it and enjoy himself.
>
and Chad Cosper noted:
> thinking about all of the Wilco and UT shows I have seen, I
> began to wonder how much of this is posturing. He seemed to really be
> enjoying himself onstage with UT and on the AM tour, but beginning with
> Being There, he seems to have become the disenchanted rock star.
>
The issue of what kind of performance and stage demeanor a performer "owes" an
audience and their best presentation of their work is an important one to me.
I've heard some bad stories about Tweedy's petulant stage demeanor, though
I've never seen it myself. But how the audience's bad behavior affects the
performance needs to be taken into account. At the recent Steve Earle/Del
McCoury Band show, Steve got into it with the apparently drunken guy who kept
shouting for "Copperhead Road".
Earle worked it into his performance (sort of annoyingly to me-I couldn't hear
him in front but apparently Earle could), staring at the guy during songs,
walking to that side of the stage away from the action, refusing to just let
it go. Finally he had to let the guy have it "did you really think I wasn't
gonna play this you stupid %^$#@!?" but Tom had previously said to Kevin's
observation:
> > He finally broke out of his funk when he got pissed off at a couple of
> > drunks in the front row. They wanted him to speed up "New Madrid", so
> > he deliberately slowed it down to spite them. The rest of the audience
> > got a kick out of it, and it was the most engaged I'd seen Tweedy all
> > evening.
>
> I'm glad he said something to them; they'd been pretty obnoxious
> throughout the show. (From what I could tell, they'd driven down from
> Ottowa and presumably are following the band for a few shows at least.)
> Jumped up on stage to dance during "Hesitating Beauty", tried to put a hat
> on Jeff's head while he was playing (which he did *not* appreciate),
> pestered Jay to smoke more, threw t-shirts up on the stage...I'm glad they
> enjoy the band, but there's a fine line between being a fan and being a
> nuisance. Did anyone see why the security guy dove at one of them from
> across the stage during the encore? I think he was confiscating recording
> gear, but there were a couple of people in the way and I couldn't clearly
> see what was going on.
>
> Tweedy actually stopped the song completely: "You know, I don't care how
> fucking far you drove to see us. You don't give the band directions."
And really, for me, that sort of sums it up. Abstaining Tom caught these
details about these guys, and I wonder how much patience on-the-wagon Tweedy
needed to have with these obnoxious idiots. If the club can't take steps to
quiet, or remove drunken-stupid patrons who are disrupting the performance, I
can't blame the performer for getting pissed-off enough about it to "break
character", so to speak.
b.s.
