May 10, 2024 – Moda Center, Portland, OR, USA

Show Notes:

After opening sets by Matt’s Wipers tribute band Is This Real? and Deep Sea Diver, the familiar strains of Release open the show. Ed sings “…dear Chris…” for his brother. Nothing As It Seems gives Mike a chance to go…

Show Notes: 

After opening sets by Matt’s Wipers tribute band Is This Real? and Deep Sea Diver, the familiar strains of Release open the show. Ed sings “…dear Chris…” for his brother. Nothing As It Seems gives Mike a chance to go off early. Jeff is stellar during the Present Tense jam, quick fluid bass runs all over the place. Ed says “Good evening…don’t worry about a curfew, we’re not really paying attention to that tonight,” which elicits applause from the crowd, and then praises Is This Real?, saying he was worried Matt might be tired, but it seems to have energized him, so “look out Portland, here we come!” The silhouettes are up again for the 4th song, and just like the tour opener it’s Given to Fly. Ed goes high on the first verse and changes the line to “made it to P-town,” letting the crowd take the “…fuckers!” line. The Dark Matter opening mini-set follows, looks like this will be a mainstay of the tour. After React/Respond, Ed talks about Gerry Lopez, a surfer who moved to Oregon from Hawaii, known for his Lightning Bolt brand of surfboards. He says they named Lightning Bolt after him, and that about 6 months ago they played him the new record and the next one was his favorite, leading into Wreckage. Following Dark Matter, Ed jokes that there’s “no slouching up on stage” because all their wives are there and they’re trying to impress them. He gives special recognition to Mike and his wife Ashley, who just celebrated their 19th anniversary, and teases that “she went home after the last solo.” The W.M.A. tag is funky, Ed adding some angular guitar and Jeff transitioning into the actual W.M.A. bass line at the end. Stone has a fantastic solo on Not For You and the Modern Girl tag returns, perhaps due to Carrie Brownstein from Sleater-Kinney’s role in Portlandia (the setlist also has “Portlandia” at the top”). Before Even Flow, Ed mentions the Satyricon, a small club they played back in the early days and talks about the inspiration for the song, and Mike takes another opportunity to put on a clinic. Seven O’Clock is a request, dedicated to Connie Kellar. Waiting For Stevie makes its much-anticipated debut, Ed goes down to a small platform down by the rail to sing the second verse and Mike absolutely crushes the solo, taking it into the stratosphere. After Last Exit, Ed is strumming chords on his guitar and talks about grief, mentioning that 2 days ago was the 9-year anniversary of his brother Chris’s accidental passing while climbing in Africa, almost breaking down in tears talking about it. He adds that he’s given a lot of advice to other people about grief, but “all that advice…I could not hear it myself.” A somber moment. During the break, Ed gets on the overhead projector once again:

Keep Portland WEIRD-ER

than Seattle

ANY SONG REQUESTS?

LOUDER, CAN’T HEAR

WAIT, ONE AT A TIME

We love Sleater-Kinney

We love Quasi

We love Mudhoney

We love Steve Albini [who had passed just days prior]

How about this for a request…?

more reasonable laws about gun access & safety…

AND LESS laws about a woman’s body!!!

C’mon!!

Ed comes back out and has Tom Petty’s guitar again, telling a story of how Tom traded it to him, and I Won’t Back Down is dedicated to Dr. David Gunn. Do the Evolution has the alternate video again tonight, just like Vancouver night 1, and Ed adds “…same old shit…” after the “admire my clone” line. Crazy Mary is less folksy and more anthemic tonight, the band adding some arena rock accents to it, Mike has his guitar pointed up at the sky. A reworked Mamasan trilogy follows, Once then Alive into Footsteps, only the third time it’s been done in this order and the first since Pittsburgh 2003 (The first was Reno 1993). Ed intros the band and says goodbye, but then the lights go out and Setting Sun again closes the show.


November 29, 2013 – Moda Center, Portland, OR, USA

Show Notes:

Pendulum starts off on the wrong note, but it doesn’t sidetrack the song. Low Light is powerful leading into a fast, shouty Sometimes, with Ed asking “…are you laughing here, dear god?” Matt is on fire during Lightning Bolt, driving…

Show Notes: 

Pendulum starts off on the wrong note, but it doesn’t sidetrack the song. Low Light is powerful leading into a fast, shouty Sometimes, with Ed asking “…are you laughing here, dear god?” Matt is on fire during Lightning Bolt, driving and muscular. Mike solos over Stone’s lead as well, to great effect. MYM keeps getting faster, played at a breakneck pace tonight. Ed says that the last time they played Portland was a benefit for “the Pacific Northwest School…am I saying that correctly…the Northwest School?” and then jokes “no, don’t embarrass me in front of all these people, just go with what I’m saying…I don’t know what the FUCK I’m talking about…” Sirens is dedicated to Tomas Young and his wife Claudia, who are in attendance, and it includes a long acoustic reprise at the end with Ed really going for the vocal inflections and the crowd loud, leading Ed to utter “thank you for that” quickly afterwards. He sees a couple of people in the crowd and calls them out:

“…what’s that thing you’re doing there, there’s like two confetti machine people here, nice! I was wondering what you symbolized…it’s like, they’re the military-industrial complex and they’re tearing money and throwing it up in the air…are we paying you money to do that for the whole show? We should…thanks! It’s making it exciting for me, you’re picking really good spots…”

He continues, pointing out the Yankees hat on the fan, causing the crowd to boo, and joking about the rivalry between the Yankees and the (non-existent) Portland baseball team, “it’s a crazy one I know, I just can’t remember…,” and adds “we’re going to play another new one” leading into Even Flow. Matt has a tremendous drum solo on Even Flow, a full minute long, Ed exhorting the crowd immediately after “…come on! He did that for you…” and shouting out “Matt fucking Cameron!” before the very end instead of Mike. He points out after that while everyone yesterday was celebrating the “pilgrims stealing Indians’ food, whatever that thing is,” they were giving thanks for Matt on his birthday, leading to the Cameron-penned You Are, the first performance since 2011. Ed asks for the lights up, pointing out a fan with a hat and a “Luv Co.” shirt, and Jeff interjects “that’s Concert Dave!” Ed says Jeff has the only other Luv Co. shirt and teases Jeff, “do you know ALL these people?” Infallible is “for Earth.” Lukin is started but abandoned before Ed starts singing. He runs through the riff a couple of times and then teases “you know, when you hear the song played and you hear the technicalities involved, it’s very intense…” He continues, talking about how he hates when people from Seattle call Portland “P-town,” adding “but Portlandia, I think that’s great…which is funny because this song came to me while having a bit of chamomile tea at the feminist bookstore,” and Lukin is restarted. Jeff and Matt highlight a frenetic RVM jam. After the break, Ed wants another bottle of wine and jokes “give that one to that little kid, he looks like he’s five years old or something.” He adds that Jeff noted there hasn’t been a Portland crowd this good since 1992 or ‘93, “and you figure that was a while back so most of those people are dead, this is like a new crowd, a new generation.”

To start the encore, The End is played by Ed solo and by request. Just Breathe is dedicated to Jason Baldwin of the West Memphis Three, also in attendance, who’s getting married soon. The crowd makes their feelings known on the “Mother” lines about running for president and trusting the government. Everyone sings Happy Birthday to Matt, with Ed asking Janet Weiss from Sleater-Kinney to count it off and pointing out Matt’s kids Ray and Josie and wife April before starting Better Man. Over the Wasted Reprise chords, Ed talks about all the friends they have there and thanks everyone, adding that Tomas Young had left, having decided that he didn’t want to continue on, moving to Portland, “the end of the Earth for happiness.” He continues, talking about how he mentioned Dick Cheney in Oakland and someone thought he should have moved on, leading Ed to rant passionately about Cheney and getting worked up about Tomas’ condition, closing with:

“…there are some things that even if you forgive you should not forget, just so we don’t let them happen again…we can’t let that happen again…and if Tomas sits there, all of fucking…34 years tomorrow, he’ll be 34 years tomorrow, and now I think he weighs about 65 pounds, look, if he can go through all this, and that makes a difference towards this never happening again he’ll be alright with the whole situation, he will have felt like he died a life…lived, and something that made a difference and it’s all up to us to make his life make a difference, thanks for listening.”

Stone starts Alive instead of Black and stops, the band going into jazz mode and Ed adding “I’m good either way…Portland jazz alley…come on it’s Matt’s birthday, let’s play some jazz…” Prior to Rockin’, Ed asks for reinforcements, calling on Corin Tucker, Carrie Brownstein, Peter Buck, Scott McCaughey, and Janet Weiss to help “take it home,” an impromptu Sleater-Kinney reunion onstage.