[Slowhand] Belated Chicago

[Mark Deavult]

Hello All,

Had a great time visiting the Chess Records studio Saturday - anyone who
hasn't gone, it's highly recommended and the high point of any trip to the
Windy City.

Nice get-together before the show - good to see so many old and some new
friends before the show!  Good restaurant recommendation, decent food and
drink, good service as well.  If you didn't go - you missed out!

Before my trip to Chicago I had at least a half dozen people tell me "ugh.
The United Center sucks!". Now I know why they say that - it sucks!  Not a
bad venue visually but the sound quality, like that of the Conseco
Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, leaves much to be desired.  Interestingly I had
almost the same exact seats in multiple venues so was able to directly
compare the acoustics since the PA setup is the same, the the UC and Conseco
are far worse than those in Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, DC, and Philly (in
that order).  The sound was somewhat muddy (not waters) but at least lacked
that nasty slapback that the Indy show had. Since the arenas are all about
the same size, I'd guess it comes down to internal arrangements and the
amount of acoustic work put into the design.

EC seemed a bit tired Saturday and the show, although good by most
standards, was certainly the weakest out of all those I've seen/heard from
the US leg of the tour.  This is not a complaint - no one can hit the ball
out of the park every single night, and .990 is still better than most will
ever do.  But EC did make a number of flubs/mistakes, and seemed more laid
back - for instance no opening solo to "Walk Out in the Rain".  About the
only times he really cut loose and get out of the box a bit at the show were
during a nice "Sheriff" and just a bit during the outro to "Sunshine".
Doyle seemed to pick up some of the slack and was in fine form.  Nate was
beaming all night - happy anniversary! Again, not a bad night at all, but
definitely not the performance found at the previous show in Indy.  If I had
to rate the top shows so far off the top of my head, in descending order
they would be: Philly, Columbus, MSG #3, Indy, Detroit, Cleveland - and a
definite "honorable mention" to the "I want a little girl" from Tampa.

Buddy Guy was in Europe so nothing special, not that it would have killed EC
to maybe pull out "Sweet Home" for the encore, but unfortunately the Setlist
Generator seems to be stuck again after some nice changes on the Europe leg
of the tour.  Bad news folks - the setlists are photocopied, and that ain't
a good sign. Babyface was in town for a show the next night, shame he didn't
sit in for a version of CtW but then again, that pesky Setlist Generator
gets in the way. Perhaps they wanted to play it but they don't have any
whiteout for the setlist in case someone wanted to sniff it!

And a nice time Sunday at the HOB Gospel Brunch - thanks to Lauren for
recommending this, not something I would have tried without prodding but
quite worthwhile.  As one of the few who hasn't been to the HOB I was
pleasantly surprised, I've always gotten a chuckle out of the Hard Rock
which strikes me as sort of a contrived joke to get tourist suckers to pay
too much for mediocre fast food but the food at the HOB was excellent as was
the entertainment - hats (porkpie of course) off to them.

A few things I learned on my EC travels this summer:

- NYC cabbies have the right of way no matter what the stoplight says.
Cross at your own risk (still nursing a bum ankle)

- Doyle doesn't smile much. Maybe he's smiling on the inside.  Plays his ass
off tho.

- Columbus ain't much on culture but if you want brew pubs, it's the place
to be.

- Be nice to the ticket agents at the Box Office.  They hold the keys to
your future ;)

- Robert Randolph and the Family Band are very, very cool.

- Everyone who lives in/around Chicago and drives a car is insane. All of
them.

- In Indy if someone offers to buy you a "local brew beer" make sure they
don't give you the one with an orange in it - you have been warned. Pub
crawls in that city can lead to memory loss and headache.

- EC and band put on their best shows when they've had a day off.

And last, but not least:

Make sure you let your credit card and cell phone companies know when you'll
be travelling lest they panic and turn everything off thinking they've been
stolen!

Cheers,
Mark