FraKctured - live performances - audient report

21/05/00 - 12th and Porter, Nashville

Paul Carr - Beast, Beast! - Frakctured was even more of scorcher than Friday night

From Trey Gunn's diary at www.treygunn.com

May 21, 2000 -- Nashville, TN - 12th and Porter

Today we will do two shows. A matinee at 3:45pm and then an evening show at 9:00pm. We added the matinee because the other three shows sold so well to people from out of town that the local fans couldn't even get tickets. So, we are expecting a heavy Nashville crowd for the first show.

Playing two shows is a real challenge. You have to give the full monte for the first one, but you also have to save something for the second one. I'll keep reminding myself that they are two and I'll probably be OK.

I can remember when The Trey Gunn Band played The Bottom Line two years ago. Everyone plays two shows at this New York city venue. We played a fantastic first show, with a nearly sold-out house. It was a real move forward with this band. I was hanging around, relaxing, backstage talking with Bob and Tony and then suddenly I remembered: we have another show to do in 30 minutes! It really caught me off-guard.

The last two shows are done and we're set for the European tour. This was a very, very good thing to have done -- these four warm-up shows. The band has gotten to play in the music, and play in itself. We are still making tweaks within many of the tunes, however the life of each piece coming along quite well, thank you.

For our first set we played the same set-list as last nights show. It was a funny performance for me. I went out on-stage with plenty of enthusiasm, but this gradually left me. By about half-way through the show I felt like I had to feign any enthusiasm whatsoever. Not that I have to have any enthusiasm to be able to play. I'm a professional, remember? I can play an awesome show whether I feel like it or not. So, the performance was fine. But, it did feel like the inner life of it somehow drained away.

The second set was very hot. Adrian made up a new set-list starting with Larks' IV. Wow, what a beginning! This is something that we will probably rarely do because of the sound restrictions. Generally it takes about two to three pieces before the sound is really together. And Lark's being such an intense sound, and one of our key pieces, we would just as soon play it after the mix is totally together. However, having already done several shows in the same room, George has gotten the mix tweaked well enough to give us this kind of powerful beginning.
On to Copenhagen...