So, yeah, a long weekend with too little sleep, then four days of work and now I've got a moderate cold and despite the doses of DayQuil and albuterol (that's to ease the coughing) I'm feeling pretty shitty. But I've got work tomorrow and I hate letting a show recap get to its one-week anniversary, so I'm gonna give this a try. I'm thinking the happy memories will distract me from my ills.

Although artmonkeygirl had told us that fans out west are not so crazy about lining up way before doors, k1cup and I were still aiming for an early arrival. However, a motorcycle accident on 17 and post-Giants game traffic on 101 decisively nixed that plan. But artmonkeygirl was proven abundantly correct when we finally got there at about 5 (for doors at 7) and there were only two people waiting at the gray utility pole halfway down the block that marks the start of the Fillmore queue. Whew! we were two relieved dorks. And we settled in and enjoyed the company (by which I mean to say: Gail (sp?), if by some random chance you're reading this, it really was a pleasure meeting you. And I still covet your Hello Kitty bag).

Here's another thing—coming from Chicago I tend to think Californians are pretty wimpy about the cold (I mean, the other day when it was about 60° I saw a guy bundled up in a knit hat and scarf and I thought, "now that's really not necessary"), but I was getting pretty chilled during the wait. Maybe I should have worn socks.

Anyway our wait was enlivened by multiple sightings of band members going in and out of the metal cage around the backstage entrance. Flans and Marty walked by, as did Linnell (we carefully avoided eye contact with him); Iggy whizzed past on his scooter (with a happy "hey!" for k1cup); and Dan paused with us for a moment to express his confusion that the Fillmore makes you line up down the street at the post office instead of in front of the actual venue. Then later Linnell reappeared, took his bike off the truck, and cycled away down Geary. Oh my gosh! how cute. I guess it's just funny seeing somebody that you normally only see in one specific context (in this case, performing onstage), doing an ordinary everyday thing that one might do oneself, such as riding a bicycle.

The scent of fried chicken wafting our way from a KFC somewhere in the vicinity made me rather hungry (and oh my god, do I ever miss Harold's), but we decided to wait and get food inside instead (and again: hurrah for music venues that serve food). And finally 7 o'clock arrived and a security dude escorted us over to the entrance. It kind of made me feel like we were a kindergarten class being led by our teacher; I looked around to make sure I had my buddy.

Up the stairs, past the bucket of apples, and there we were. Oh, my. The Fillmore is absolutely beautiful inside, all parquet, red velvet and crystal chandeliers. There's also a fancy-looking balcony area along one side, and opposite that was a screen where they were projecting some ads, and then later messages from people in the audience (you'd send a text to a certain number and it would appear on the screen). After we had a chicken snack, k1cup started egging me on to send a message to the band, so after some debate about which of my two least favorite songs would be featured, I sent my text and soon had the pleasure of seeing "I never want to hear Older again!" scroll up the screen. Heh. If only there were any chance that anybody in the band had seen it and had the desire and power to act on it. Surely my message was much more relevant than the "tara is one hot mama" that repeatedly went by.

So, even though I know the screen was just a gimmick to earn money for Verizon, it was pretty entertaining. k1cup eventually texted a request as well, but the show started before it could display. Oh, right. The show. That's what we were there for. Yeah, I still like Oppenheimer. Tonight the guy did not comment on the lovely Californian weather (which he had the previous two nights), but he did make the joke about fireworks and airhorns again. I suppose the airhorn is integral to that one song though.

All right. They Might Be Giants. Oh, I think I will take this opportunity to make my gear notes which I forgot to do previously. Flans had this weird orange guitar I hadn't seen before, some kind of Fender (a Jazzmaster maybe?). He only played it a few times over the three nights (and he played the red Gibson only on Friday, I think). The strangest thing about it, though, was that when he got close enough to me that I could see the headstock, I noticed that it was on backwards. I mean—well, of course it was backwards because he's left-handed, but what I mean really is that the decal with the name of the guitar was applied backwards, so the letters were mirror-image. Very mysterious. Danny has a new bass—at first I wasn't sure, but it seemed like the bridge looked different, and it turns out that though it's the same candy-apple red as his other, he's now playing a Lākland, which: pretty snazzy, Danny. What else...k1cup thought Linnell might have a new keyboard. And the stand is the same, but it has new legs. Meanwhile, it appears that the iBook Dan used to use for recording the shows has been replaced by two (?) shiny new MacBook Pros. That's quite an upgrade (*is jealous*). I hope Marty got something new, too!

So, are they opening every show on this tour with The Cap'm? That is what the wiki would lead me to believe. I wonder why they love it so much as the first song. Flans also started out the evening with what was apparently a cup of tea in his hand. Oh, and here's the setlist scan, although they didn't stick to it exactly toward the end of the show. It does seem like the setlists didn't vary too much amongst the three shows I saw.

During Take Out the Trash Dan goaded Danny into coming up to the front of the stage, directly in front of me, and then they got into this challenge where they each kept lifting their instruments higher and higher as they played. At the end Danny had his up right in front of his face and Dan shook his head and backed off, defeated. He looked very amused.

Before It's Not My Birthday, Flans asked who in the crowd had a birthday that night. People started shouting and Linnell pointed at a couple of them, saying, very firmly, "Liar...liar." Hee.

Dan got to showboat a little bit more tonight than at the previous shows. Flans really got into it, too; during the Damn Good Times solo he went offstage for a minute, then reappeared with the bass drum which he proceeded to pound enthusiastically through the end of the song. When it was over and he'd put the drum away and his glasses back on, he explained, "I was feeling you playing those notes and I wanted to be a part of it, man!"

The Phone Call From the Dead was Jerry Orbach Impersonator. Flans did one new thing which was rather cute, which was that before going offstage he took Dan's mic and placed it so that it was up against the slide of the gravestones, as if the sound were really coming from there. I thought that was a nice touch. Flans wasn't trying to disguise his voice even the least little bit though.

After another couple of songs Linnell said he had just thought of a really good idea for the next time they did the Phone Calls bit, which was that they would have the tour manager Brendan come out and tell them to quit because the bit was not working & not funny (and oh, how painfully close to the truth that must be sometimes!); Linnell would argue with him about it and then pull out a gun and shoot him to death, whereupon the phone would immediately ring again. "I thought of that just now, while I was playing music," he said, and looked immensely pleased with himself.

We got two more songs with horns tonight, Withered Hope (whoo!) and (double whoo!!) Fillmore (aka San Francisco). Even though it only lasted a few seconds, it was absolutely marvelous. I am looking forward to the download of this show particularly so I can hear that one again.

The first encore started off with Fingertips, which was pretty standard, except that at the end, as Linnell started singing Darkened Corridors, I noticed Dan climbing up onto the speaker stack at stage right. It was really a clamber to get up there, too. Then the guitar tech handed his Strat up to him and he proceeded to tear through the closing solo, with his head literally touching one of the chandeliers and the tech clutching the back of the speaker to give it more stability. It was fucking insane. When he came back down Flans was just sort of speechless for a moment and passed off to Linnell. And Linnell said something like, "I just want to say, that scared the crap out of me. Don't ever do that again." But Dan looked super-stoked; seriously, happier than at any other point during the whole weekend. He behaved after that, though.

Second encore: Doctor Worm, with confetti (I love watching the moment when the cannon is triggered). After that Flans took another moment to show us the signed gatefold vinyl Elses they're selling; as he was about to put it away people started reaching their hands out, and he stepped forward and gave it to a girl in the front. She was absolutely thrilled; it was pretty cute. And finally Istanbul, and then it was over. Boo-hoo! because who knows when I will get to see them again. I'm glad the last show of the trio was by far the best, though.

So the house lights came up and this girl pushed up to the front in between me and k1cup. I asked Neil for a setlist and he brought it over to me, but as he held it out the pushy girl leaned out and tried to snatch it instead. Now, I've really tried to adhere to a nonviolence policy ever since that incident in St Louis a couple years ago, but here I felt justified in taking action, so with a carefully-timed hip-check and a quick jump I managed to grab hold of it, and gave my relieved thanks to Neil.

As we headed out, Dan appeared at the soundboard to collect his computer(s?), so I stopped to say goodbye. I also asked him (jokingly!) if he would take us to the "AFTER PARTAY" that was indicated at the bottom of the setlist. He then claimed that he hadn't been invited either, but I think he was just lying because he didn't want us crashing his partay.

And out we went into the chilly San Francisco night. We walked up and down a little bit with Gail and her friends, to see if any of the band might appear, but I guess they were all at their partay, so we didn't linger too long. And the trip back down 101 took nearly no time.

It was really an excellent weekend, not just for the shows but for seeing old friends and meeting new ones! Maybe next time I'll get to go out East instead. In the meantime, I have memories and pictures. k1cup, hope you had a good trip home!