Before I say anything else about this fantastic show, let this be known:

Billy Bragg winked at me.

Yes, me. And don't you say he was really winking at the person next to me, because I know he wasn't and I have proof, but you'll have to read the full report if you are still skeptical about it.

This show was part of the Tell Us the Truth tour, which is a group of musicians and activists touring with an anti-media consolidation/pro-fair trade agenda. The politics weren't really that heavy, and the music was great.

Setlist:

Lester Chambers (backed by the ensemble):
People Get Ready / Everyday / Five Long Years

The Nighwatchman:
Until the End / No One Left / Branding Iron / Maximum Firepower / House Gone Up in Flames

Speakers:
Chellie Pingree (president of Common Cause) / Lori Wallach (Director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch)

Boots Riley (of The Coup):
Underdogs / 5 Million Ways to Kill a CEO / Ride the Fence / Wear Clean Drawers

Billy Bragg:
Sexuality / She Came Along to Me / NPWA / Upfield / The Wolf Covers Its Tracks / The Price of Oil / There Is Power in a Union / Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards

Ensemble:
People Get Ready (reprise)/medley // Time Has Come Today

Check out some photos, many of which are blurry.

Even without Billy winking at me, this show would have been pretty thrilling.

I ran out on my class early and probably needn't have; I got to Park West at about 5:30 (doors at 6) to find just a handful of people waiting. The soundcheck was still going on; we could see through glass doors (adorned with oh-so-tasteful etchings of naked ladies) into the lobby, and when at one point Billy himself appeared and checked out the t-shirt stand, it was really more thrilling to me than it should have been.

I was the third person in the door and scampered down to the front. The show was general admission but there were tables set up in the pit area, long, narrow tables that were arranged like rays out from the stage, with chairs set perpendicularly along the long sides. I ended up in the very front in just about the exact center. Whoopee!

All the performers came out onstage at the beginning and Lester Chambers held up a little disposable camera, asking us if we minded if he took our picture. "Now I got memories," he said with satisfaction, when he'd snapped a photo. He sang some blues and played harmonica, and he was excellent.

Billy Bragg then introduced The Nightwatchman (Tom Morello) and pointed out that the long tables would be used later during the "heavy metal" portion of the show. "We'll be running down them," he explained, "so you might want to move that ashtray."

People around me had been talking and talking about how great a guitarist Tom Morello is (I didn't know anything about him except that he's apparently the guitarist for Audioslave? Rage Against the Machine?), so I was quite interested in his set. Very oddly, I thought, he was using a (nylon-stringed) classical guitar, and he was using a pick on it, which I was told in my guitar class is a no-no for a classical guitar. But he played it very well. I read a review of the show in the Trib today which compared his voice to Leonard Cohen's, and I do agree with that. But I actually didn't find his set all that compelling. I think the singing matters to me too much. However, I did enjoy the guitaring.

After the Nightwatchman there was a short intermission and then a couple of speakers from two of the groups that are sponsoring the tour. Okay, I have to admit I'm politically very apathetic and cynical; the speeches and stuff do get me all angry, but afterwards I genuinely feel that there's nothing I can do about it. It's quite discouraging. Anyway the speeches were pretty short and Boots Riley came out.

After Billy, Boots Riley was definitely the highlight of the night. He did an astonishing unaccompanied rap (Underdogs) and then Lester Chambers and Lester's bass player and the Nightwatchman (I'm gonna keep calling him that) came out to accompany him on a few more raps. The last one was a song he told us he wrote for his daughter (Wear Clean Drawers), and it was so excellent, not just for the girl-power message in it, but because it was so damn good, and funny. I was a little bit in love by the end of his (too brief) set.

But then Billy came out and I forgot about all that other stuff. He started out on an acoustic guitar. Billy on acoustic guitar? What th--?

Oh, man, it was beautiful. Billy himself told us he wasn't much accustomed to playing an acoustic, and I could tell it was true just by looking at his instrument--he had a cutaway Takamine with gold hardware and there wasn't the least scratch on that satin finish (and no pickguard!). Basically it looked brand-new. The crowd grew respectfully quiet when he started to sing, and his voice filled the room and was so gorgeous.

Of course in between songs he drank tea and talked to us about politics and stuff. He expressed his puzzlement about all the excitement surrounding the University of Minnesota's win of Paul Bunyan's ax. "It's not even a real ax!" said Billy.

He'd brought an electric guitar too and this one was also beautiful and looked brand-new. It was silvery gray-blue and was shaped mostly like a Telecaster but also a little bit like a Jazzmaster (more angled). It wasn't a Fender though. (But I couldn't read the name on the headstock.) <edit>I've been told it was a Jim Dyson guitar, so the mystery is thankfully solved.</edit> So he played a few more songs and finished with Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards. That song is always topical. You know why? Not because Billy originally wrote it with universal themes--okay, partly that--but mostly because he changes the lyrics every now and then to make it pertain to the current political situation. Billy's the greatest.

Everybody came out again when Billy's solo set was done. I realized I forgot to mention that Mike Mills was there. That's because Mike didn't do very much--he didn't sing or talk, he just hung out at his keyboard during Lester Chamber's set and then again at the end. So they all came out and did this great medley of a bunch of different songs most of which I didn't know. The crowd had been very calm the whole show but finally during this song some kids came down on the aisles and started dancing. There were like 5 of them. But when the song ended people stood up to clap, and when the ensemble came back out for the encore most people remained standing/dancing. So I was on my feet there at the very front (no barrier between the people and the stage), mere inches away from Billy Bragg (and Boots Riley, for that matter), and as the last song ended and Billy was walking away from his mic he winked at me. And the guy behind me kind of nudged me (he'd seen it too) and looked at me like, "you lucky, lucky girl" and I was like "AAAAHHH!" and then it was all over. Billy was leaving but the kids on my left (the ones who incited the dancing) held their hands up like "touch me Billy!" and he relented and did, but he was too far away to shake my hand. But then I thought, well, it was me he winked at and that was way more thrilling than it should have been.

Open for trades, email me if you're interested. I'm actually considering opening up a BitTorrent of this show but I want to make sure it's good enough quality since I don't want to put something too crappy out there.