My Trip to see Damien Rice(lots of pics)

[Lance]

I saw my third and fourth damien rice shows last week. what a treat it was. he and the band never disappoint. i had been counting down the days for months to see the shows. my wife and i went to the murray, ky and the nashville shows.

before i get to the rest of this...here are my pics: feel free to use them as you please. if anyone wants any high res, just PM me the numbers and i'll email you the pics.

murray: http://www.flickr.com/photos/3401721...7602041086225/
nashville: http://www.flickr.com/photos/3401721...7602030466686/

we got to murray way earlier than i had planned. it turned out it was only a two hour drive from where i live. murray is literally in the middle of nowhere. i still have no idea why damo played there. however, i'm very happy he did!!

my wife and i walked around campus and we saw two tour buses.



i didn't want to stalk damo...but i thought heck...this has to be the best chance i'll ever get to meet him. there was no one around. kim and i sat on a bench and we could hear them soundchecking. that was neat to get some free live music.

sure enough damien walked out and i said, 'hey damo'. he turned around and smiled. i asked if we could get a picture and he said in his irish accent, 'i don't do pictures and laughed.' he said, 'are you going to the show tonight?' i said absolutely, and nashville tomorrow. i told him how much i appreciated his music and he had been a great inspiration to me learning to play the guitar. i fully admit i was pretty nervous. heck...i've been talking about this guy for over a year...and now i'm meeting him. he said hello to my wife, and i said...have a great show tonight. he thanked us for coming and we left. he's a little fella. didn't realize he was so small. it was really neat to meet him. i hope he didn't feel like we stalked him. we didn't take too much of his time.

so heck..that was worth the whole trip right there! on to the show. the auditorium was a tiny little building on campus. you wouldn't even know it was a music theatre from the outside.



we had fourth row dead center seats. the closest by far that i've seen him. so the lights go down, and one by one some crazy looking costume people come out to the front of the stage. some super strange outfits. everyone's face was covered. they all played some unique instruments. bongo drums. some sort of xylophone, the last person on the right played a guitar...and i knew it was damo's guitar. obviously it was the band. but at the time we weren't sure. they played for about 6-7 minutes. some strange music. no singing. no real interaction with each other. and then one by one they got up and left off stage. then the lights came back up. peculiar way to start the show. i took some pictures. at the time, i didn't know if security would let us take pictures...so these pics are awful. but it will give you an idea.





about 10 minutes later damo comes out and opens with the professor. one of the many songs i was hoping for.

the crowd at murray was really different. it was 95% college kids. they were really rude and boisterous. there was a lot of shouting during songs and while damo was talking. there were a group of 7-8 girls in the front right that were really loud and annoying. but the upside to the youthful crowd was the energy. the crowd stood for a lot of the songs. after the first few chords of me, my yoke, and i the crowd went crazy and stood up. vyv was even taken back and smiled at the reaction. damo fed off it. so it was a pretty good trade off...rude...yet rowdy.

here is the set as i typed it on my phone. it may not be 100% accurate:

Murray 9.12.07

the professor(solo)
older chests
delicate
volcano
me, my yoke, and i
rootless tree
amie
eskimo friends
woman like a man
grey room
i remember
cannonball (unplugged)
----------------------

9 crimes
blowers daughter
coconut skins

damo didn't tell as many stories as he had done in my previous two shows. right before woman like a man...he said i have a friend that's a girl. she has ****ed me over a lot, but no matter what she does i always love her. but i wrote this song about her.

before i remember he told the story about going to the grocery store. he hated going, but found a very attractive girl who worked there. so he started going to the grocery store a lot. he then added that she didn't end up being the girl he thought she was, and that the song had two parts. the first happy and then the latter.

during the encore break...i told my wife that all i had told my friends is i wanted to hear coconut skins. i was surprised he didn't play it. i didn't think he put it in the encore

sure enough after 9 crimes and blowers daughter...he busted into it. i got all excited and started doing my white boy dance. in the middle of the song damo slowed the tempo down and started going TICK TOCK TICK TOCK. he said time is running out...we're all gonna die soon. get your ass out of your seat and come to the stage. everyone rushed the stage and they jammed the hell out of that song. it was awesome. he went into the stp vaseline jam. then the new drummer just went nuts on the drums. damo was smiling watching him do his solo. it went on for a long long time.

everyone was up against the stage jumping up and down it was a great way to end the show. here's a few of my favorite pics i took.









on to the ryman...








a completely different atmosphere in nashville. a much older and respectable crowd. of course the down side was there was no standing or dancing during the show. on the plus side...no one interrupted damo.

the acoustics in this place are amazing. you could hear damo's foot tapping the floor as he kept the beat. it was really noticeable during the unplugged cannonball. here is the nashville set.

ryman auditorium, september 13, 2007

rootless tree
volcano
me, my yoke, and i
delicate
older chests
the professor
amie
woman like a man
accidental babies
dogs
coconut skins
cannonball (unplugged)
----------------------

vyv solo song (happy thoughts will save me)
blowers daughter
i remember
cheers darlin


damo threw me a curve on the opener. i didn't know that he played rootless tree on the organ. i had only seen it on the piano. i prefer it on guitar, however what a great way to start the show. the limited edition ryman poster featured the tree. only 70 posters were made(according to someone at the ryman):



i was really happy to get me, my yoke and i again. damn that song rocks. we were in the front of the balcony. a great place to see the show. damo talked a lot more in nashville. some great stories that kept the crowd laughing. he explained older chests. he told of us a friend that had a bookshelf that was so full it was about to break. he asked his friend to name a line in any of the books. he claimed we have too much crap. he also talked about ugly buildings being built in dublin that replaced older beautiful buildings. he said he hoped the next generation would turn things around. including the music. he said current music is '****'.

he told the wank off story before the professor. that was hilarious. he invented the wank test to determine if a girl was date worthy.

in the encore vyv came out by herself. i had no idea she sings. it was a cutesy kids kinda of song. she set it up about a spider biting a crew member. she dedicated the song to him. her voice is squeaky. she's adorable. she played to the crowd well.



i remember really rocked out hard. that song is so great. another great closer.

then came cheers darlin.







the story was very long before the song started. i've seen him do this in louisville and indy. however, it was much funnier and better executed in nashville. he had the crowd really laughing hard. at the end snow fell from the ceiling and he stumbled off stage.

some of my favorite nashvile pics:







it was a great two nights. my wife and i had a fabulous time. i have a horrible feeling it will be years before i can ever see him again. i'm sure he won't be in the states anytime soon. he even mentioned in between songs that he won't be back for awhile, but he appreciated everyone coming out.

[Lance]

i'm sorry this is so long...but i thought some of you might appreciate the little details. if i have anything wrong, or you have something to add that i left out...by all means post it.

[SisterMidnight]

wow. i've only read through the murray show review and i'm impressed.. you've totally captured the fine nuances of a damien rice gig, and your pictures are fantastic! definitely one for the memory books, eh?

glad you and your wife had such an amazing time, thanks for sharing i for one love the details..

[.em.]

thanks for the stories! they both sound-crazy awesome, especially the first.

[SisterMidnight]

yeah, the rowdy crowd would have been fun! i've been wanting to catch a gig like that but the shows i go to are usually mellow

i bet meeting damien didn't suck too much either

[Lance]

thanks for the kind words. meeting damien was tremendous. it was funny how nervous i was. i can't remember the last time i was that nervous

[SisterMidnight]

he has that effect on people

[zaphir]

very nice pictures!!!!

[dboyd]

wow.. i'm once again.. jealoussss! lol... i hope i get to do what u did in the near future.. only longer! lol.. i really want to move around for a little while and see things and also see damien perform a lot.. but i see he has nothing planned after october so i'm guessing it's damien's break time (well deserved i might add, all though he never came back to vancouver! ). but thanks for sharing! some great pics!

[viv]

I was at both concerts as well. I love your pictures! I didn't take any. Though I didn't think Damien was a part of the "opening act" everyone looked way too tall. I"m pretty sure it was Joel, Vyvienne, the drummer (why can't I remember this new guy's name?) and a member of the crew. I could be wrong though. Either way it was cool/funny. And those loud girls were pretty much right next to me. They talked the ENTIRE time, kept dropping their cell phones and did I mention the talking? I was not very nice to them, but it didn't make a difference.

[mariaoran]

Thanks Lance!!

Thanks for coming back with so many details ... I always luv the details!!!
I luv your pictures!!!... oh my god i'm glad you took so many
ooooh and those pics from the opening of the Murray show!!! just great!!

So glad .... and jealous! ... that you got to meet Damo and talk to him for some time!!!!
Did you get to meet anybody else from the band!?


So sorry about the terrible audience Viv!! ... I would've been so angry at those girls!!!!

[hyacinth]

Great pics, thanks for sharing!

[lalla32]

We *LOVE* details!! Thank you so much for the lovely reviews! And amazing pictures! Glad you such an awesome time with your wife!

I wonder if Damo really knows how much he gives to people who love him and his music...

[cille]

Thanks for sharing, great thread!

Wow, Damien's hair really does grow fast

[Constanze]

thanks for sharing, Lance!

[Lance]

thanks again y'all. i only met damo. i didn't see anyone else.

so we must've been pretty close to each other viv. those girls were such attention whores. ugh. she was yelling rat in the grain 2 minutes into cannonball.

but i did love being able to stand up and dance. i gotta get my groove on. hahaha


i wish to heck i would've taken more focused pics of the murray opener. i was being stealthy cuz i didn't want to get busted with a camera right in the beginning. i really thought the person on the right with the guitar was damo...but you might be right. it was so hard to tell with those crazy costumes. have they been doing that opening act most of the tour?? they didn't do it in nashville

[viv]

I think Murray was the only time they opened with that. And I didn't get a good look at the one who may or may not have been Damien. I only saw him walk out. So maybe it was him!

[davidcotyalex]

Great stuff and awesome photos - and what a shame - these folks over at dr.com asked for our seats and we faxed them the ticketmaster printouts - a couple hours later they came back that they couldn't go - well at that time I was much more concerned about my mom (who is better now thank god)....you can see the three vacant front row seats in your ryman pic from the balcony! What a shame those seats went unused - man that was bad timing!!

Oh well such is life.....

[queencassie]

Hey, thanks for the pics and details! I was at the Nashville concert, and it's great to hear about it again. Truly wonderful experience, I was about 20 feet to the right of Damien, just wish I had taken pics. Thanks for listing the order of the songs too.

Oh and I got one of those awesome posters! They really only made 70 of them? How many people were at the Ryman concert?

[Lance]

man that's awful about those seats! ugh

the lady at the ryman told me there were only 70 posters.

my friend that lives in nashville posted this on a dmb board:

about the posters..
i called hatch showprint around 8am and they were more than happy to tell me they were all out, they even had a big sign on their door saying, we DO NOT have the damien rice poster! haha, i guess it was a big seller. i had also heard there were only about 100 made, so lucky you lance!

so i guess either way it wasn't very many. i believe the ryman holds around 2200.

[queencassie]

Originally Posted by Lance

man that's awful about those seats! ugh

the lady at the ryman told me there were only 70 posters.

my friend that lives in nashville posted this on a dmb board:



so i guess either way it wasn't very many. i believe the ryman holds around 2200.

Oh I see, thank you! I'm glad I got one, they look great, nice layout and color, very mature.

[verenita]

amazing reviwes and pictures (i like his shaved head!)!
thank you so much (!!!) for sharing your wonderful experience with us!

[Mark Hogan]

Thanks for sharing Lance!