David Gray & Ray LaMontagne @ The Greek Theater, Berkeley CA, Sept. 10

Thanks to KFOG, I was able to see my 3rd favorite solo artist of all time (at the current moment) in concert, David Gray! (For those who are wondering, right behind Peter Gabriel & Josh Joplin, although Josh Joplin is debatable as he goes in & out of groups.  So D. Gray could be my second favorite!)

To win tickets, I had to be the first caller to answer the question, "What is the name of David Gray's latest album?"  Piece of cake for me, but not the first six or so people who called!  Obviously I deserved the tickets more than them. :P

The concert was billed as David Gray & Ray LaMontagne, with Tift Merritt as the opener.

At 7:00 sharp Tift Merritt came on.  She looked & sounded like pretty generic Americana.  She wasn't bad but I couldn't get into her music.  She only stayed on for about 20 minutes, though.

 

Next up was Ray LaMontagne.  I've never been a fan of him, but I must say no complaints about his performance!  I thought his band (the Pariah Dogs) had very good chemistry & he did make singing and playing the guitar seem effortless.  I did appreciate the music more seeing him live.  The songwriting on the other hand...I still could not get into his stream of consciousness, half-baked lyrics.  It's as if they're incomplete (and, to a degree, so's his music).  I can see how that can be appealing, though & do see why many seem to like him.  Still not a fan, though.

David Gray was a rock star.  Band of 6 dudes wearing fancy suits, playing cool-looking instruments, well done lighting, and jumping all over the place.  (He did try too hard to rock out to the first few songs though, esp. 'Sail Away'   ) Still sounded great, though.  In fact, he didn't play a lot of his recent stuff, or anything off of the new B-sides release "Foundling" which was fine with me.  It seemed to be more of a greatest-hits type gig, saving the best three for last (pre-encore): Be Mine, Babylon, & Please Forgive Me.  "Be Mine" was spectacular and confirmed my thoughts that, while not my favorite single by him (I'd rank it middle-of-the-pack) it really should have been his biggest hit; unfortunately ATO totally bungled the order of release of singles with from "A New Day at Midnight" (which, to my disappointment, was underrepresented at this show) He did the same thing with "Babylon" as last time I saw him, which was make the audience yell "if you want it, come & get it" before playing.  He ended the show (pre-encore) with "Please Forgive Me" & an additional (and much appropriately-placed) spotlight was on the drummer.

Set list: (Didn't write down & look up Tift Merritt's, hope nobody's too disappointed about that )

Ray LaMontagne:
1. For the Summer
2. New York City's Killing Me
3. Forever My Friend
4. Let It Be Me
5. Beg Steal or Borrow
6. Repo Man
7. Jolene
8. Old Before Your Time
9. Hold You In My Arms
10. God Willin' & the Creek Don't Rise
11. Like Rock N Roll
12. Henry Nearly Killed Me (It's a Shame)
Encore:
13. Trouble
14. You Are the Best Thing

(This was actually the one thing that bothered me about his set - he has 5 singles, he played 4 of them, but two were the two encore songs.  IMO it's not good form to play your songs that everyone knows as the encore songs, unless you have enough to fill your set pre-encore with them. )

David Gray:
1. Draw the Line
2. Fugitive
3. Sail Away
4. The One I Love
5. Now and Always
6. Say Hello Wave Goodbye
7. This Year's Love
8. Jackdaw
9. Be Mine
10. Babylon
11. Please Forgive Me
Encore:
12. Shine
13. Nemesis
14. All I Want is You (w/ Ray LaMontagne, U2 cover)

DNA