| Green Bay, WI |
| Oneida Casino |
| Sunday, March 3, 2001 |
Well, I thought that the guys couldn’t top the second SSM show (well, except for being allowed to play longer!), but I thought wrong. Green Bay was really special and I’m so glad I was there for it. Read on or skip to the show now…
It was a bright sunny day when we set out for Wisconsin. Stephanie kept me company – it was nice to have someone along for the ride this time. The drive to Green Bay got a little nasty about an hour in with some snow that made the partially cleared roads much more fun to negotiate. :P It all cleared up after awhile though...
The blue ice on Lake Michigan reminded me of stuff I’d seen at the Portage Glacier in Alaska. However, the most charming views by far were the dead deer along the side of the road and the crows that were feasting upon them…
Yum…
We rolled into the Oneida Casino early that afternoon and got checked in. Signs all over announced that the show that night was sold out.
Kim, Maria and Sam arrived not to long after us and we spent time roaming around yet another casino. Kim was interested in the shops upstairs until he realized his shopping choices were between a Smoke Shop and... a Smoke Shop...
Later on we ran into Robin who was in search of the venue. Of course I can never pass up the chance to be a smart ass…
ROBIN: Where are we?
ME: Green Bay.
Bah da boom! Yeah, I’ve got a million of ‘em.
Anyway we walked him to the doors of the venue - on the way he talked about an old friend from his Wisconsin Dells days who’d be at the show tonight. He hadn’t seen him in years… Once he knew how to get into the room, he asked if we’d seen Tom. We hadn't so Robin decided to hunt for him. He smiled and muttered “the black jack tables” as he headed for the casino.
About 3 minutes later Tom walks up to the venue door - sans Robin. Sam went in search of Robin to let him know that Tom had been found. :) Apparently they were working on some material that afternoon before sound check. Cool!
A little later, some of us also ran into Carla in the lobby. Seems the flight the night before had been fine – just late. They had to wait for an hour to get the snow off the plane. D’oh! Carla also told us about the folks who were supposed to be at the show that night. Some friends/fans from way back – like Daryl who used to see the guys in the early days. Sometimes he’d be the only one in the club! :)
The wait in line was long – we had to queue up early since this was a GA show. :P The doors inside were not very far from the stage though, so we could hear sound check perfectly. They did “Carnival Game” (LOVE that song!) and “Shelter” – woo hoo! The group of 10-15 of us outside clapped and cheered loudly after each. :)
The rest of the time we chatted with some fans who’d been at the SSM shows (Deana and Jeana – I know I’m butchering your names – sorry!) and David and Sherry from Green Bay. The security guy at the door was very nice – although we had to coach him on the names of the band members. :)
CT would be playing in a glorified ballroom. The stage was pretty wide though. And it looked like there were doors into a big room behind the stage where guests and crew people were milling around.
There was no opening band and CT took the stage right around 8:30 pm.
FASHION REPORT
| BEC | Doh! I don’t remember details, but I’m pretty sure it involved a print shirt and jeans. :) |
| TP | long white leather coat, black turtleneck shirt, pants and boots, cowboy hat, glasses |
| RN | some black t shirt I couldn’t read, blue jacket, black pants, etc. |
| RZ | black suit with black and gold patterned shirt and black shoes |
SET LIST
I don’t think I got this in the right order… but it’s close
| ATAS | |
| ELO KIDDIES | LOVE hearing BEC pound out this one live… |
| DOWNED | Rick and Robin kicked butt on this one |
| WRONG ALL ALONG | Rick shook Kai’s hand afterwards and asked him how they’d like that one in Germany. |
| IWYTWM | |
| IKWIW | Tom played around even more on this one than he had the night before, shaking his guitar and doing different stuff vocally |
| HOUSE IS ROCKIN’ | Kai was thrilled to hear this one live. Some more great guitar work by the one and only RN |
| OH CAROLINE | |
| 70S SONG | A big ol’ “HELLO WISCONSIN!” from Rick, natch. |
| 8 MILES LOW | |
| HT | Very intense. Rick handed off the mandocello to a boy over on his side of the stage. Dad had to help out a little. The kid was grinning from ear to ear after that. |
| SOUTHERN GIRLS | |
| SURRENDER | “Lisa’s alright, Kim’s alright, Kai’s alright!” |
| VOICES | I think Rick knows just how very much I love the guitar solo in this song, so he came right down stage and played it in front of me and Kai. Woo hoo!!!!! After polishing it off he looked at me and asked how I was… The answer: never better. :) |
| DP | Lots of energy. Very fun. |
| LOT TO LOSE | Long time fan Daryl joined them for this one and the last number. He and Rick were very fun to watch. Great stuff. |
| GOODNIGHT NOW | Kim got Tom’s bass again (for about 2 seconds) and I think Kai was handed Uncle Dick again. |
RICK BANTER
Rick’s stuff that night reflected that they were coming back to a home away from home. He talked about CT playing GB a lot back when they were getting started. “So you can see how far we’ve gone, since we’re back here again!” The club's name escapes me now... He told us he used to knock down the ceiling tiles there, so they finally knocked down the whole building… He added that one of their first fans (Daryl - mentioned above) and a beer bottle used to be the only ones in the audience at that club…
Once again, Rick singled out us fans who’d come in from far away. He also looked for some of the other friends in the crowd, asking them to raise their hands. When someone pretended to be one of these folks, Rick didn’t miss a beat: “You’re not him, you’re drunk.”
Kim provided a prop for the plug for "Silver" again. This time though, it was a page in his notebook that just said "Silver" in block letters because Kim hadn't brought his copy that night. Rick held it up and laughed, saying that the artwork on the CD was "a little different." LOL! When Rick tossed it back Kim failed to catch it so Rick instructed Kai to retrieve it for him...
At one point while Rick was waiting for a guitar issue to be resolved, he came out to the mic. Robin, Tom and Bun E messed around, playing the opening strains of a couple different songs. The last one was “It All Comes Back to You” so Rick sang that line, doing a pretty good vocal imitation of Robin.
He tried to get Tom to say something, but Tom was tangled up in his mic over on stage left. “Can you help me?” was all Tom could say as he continued to fumble with it. LOL!
MISC.
Ummmm… I know I went on and on about the second SSM show, but this show ROCKED! Even more! The guys were having a blast with us and each other. The energy reminded me of what we saw at the covers show at TF3. I just can’t emphasize enough how very, very cool it was. Not that I was there, but it felt like we were getting a taste of the ’74-75 days – complete with Rick smashing out a ceiling tile. LOL!
Robin was just on. He was very animated with lots of audience interaction. Great stuff…
Whenever I read interviews with RN he tends to dismiss the description of “guitar god” if it’s applied to him. Well, I’m sorry, Rick. After Green Bay you simply have to accept that title – and any number of assorted rock adjectives to go with it: blistering, hypnotic, mind boggling. You name it.
Hell, use all of those to describe CT’s work as a whole that night. It was just an unbelievably tight show…
You could tell they all felt pretty good about it, too. They milled around on the stage a bit longer after “Goodnight Now” and BEC even came up to the mic to wave and say goodbye to the crowd.
What a great night. I love it!
POST SHOW MISC.
A bunch of us congregated in the bar – imagine that. It was nice to get some food and drinks and wind down with my buddies before crashing for the night. What a great weekend…
Because I was still losing the insomnia battle, I headed for Chicago bright and early on Monday. The real reason for my trip up north was coming up: a nice visit with my baby brother in the city. The plan being to squeeze in as much QT with him and other buddies in town before the Rockford/Milwaukee shows. I'm looking forward to those of course, but in the mean time I’ve got many, many wonderful new CT memories to tide me over.
Thank you to everyone in and with CT for a great weekend of shows! To steal a line from a lyric of yours: so good to see you!
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© Lisa Jebsen, 2001