This road trip business has been rather more grueling than I would have anticipated, but I'm not stopping yet. Madison was a blast. Pictures, videos and scans are ready, and you can buy the show here. Now I need to spend at least a few of them sleeping before the long drive to Minneapolis tomorrow...

setlist:
Orff intro / She's an Angel / Spine / Memo to Human Resources / Clap Your Hands / Experimental Film / The Guitar / Birdhouse in Your Soul / New York City / Bastard Wants to Hit Me / James K Polk / Prevenge / Ana Ng / Violin / Spin the Dial / Older / Wearing a Raincoat / Robot Parade / Stomp Box / Drink! / Particle Man / The Famous Polka / Twisting / The End of the Tour // John Lee Supertaster / Stalk of Wheat / Doctor Worm // Fingertips

artmonkeygirl definitely gets the endurance prize for this day: she left San Francisco at about 11:30 Tuesday night, arrived at my place at some ungodly hour that I can't even remember Wednesday morning, and then was ready to go to Madison at 11am that day. We went to pick up hobbitgrrl and her friend—when we pulled up to our designated meeting area I picked out a couple of girls from the few people milling around and hypothesized, "I think that's them," and zimbra1006 said, "Uh, they're carrying a sign with William Allen White heads on it, that's probably them." Oh. Yeah, it was them. I hope they won't be embarrassed if I say they're both totally cute. And it was really fun visiting Madison with them.

So, we went to Madison. I bought a lot of beer. (That's a surprise for wallacecat, so don't tell him about it.) We got lost. (A couple of times.) And then we got to the Barrymore and parked out back. When we got out of the car we could hear them soundchecking Prevenge inside. We got in line and then hobbitgrrl and her friend went back around to listen to the soundcheck some more. When they returned they reported they'd heard The Bells Are Ringing, which was pretty exciting. But They didn't end up playing that in the show.

We waited. It took a while for the line to build. Perhaps the most exciting part of the wait was seeing TMBG crossing the street to a diner directly opposite the theater and then re-emerging almost immediately (the diner looked pretty busy).

The doors opened and we raced inside and lined up along the front of the stage in the order previously dictated for us by zimbra1006. I was rather closer to the middle than I'd been the last couple of shows, so my pictures of Linnell turned out really excellent. Meanwhile, Dan Miller's corner seemed unusually dark, so I didn't get hardly any good pictures of him, but that's somewhat counterbalanced by many more photos of Danny this time than usual. As for Flans, there were moments when I was almost positive he was deliberately posing for me—but you can judge the photos for yourself.

Common Rotation was excellent again. The last song they played unplugged, coming forward to the very front of stage, looming over our heads. It was gorgeous. After that Corn Mo came on. After the first song he remarked that his accordion was broken, right after it was supposed to have been fixed, and demonstrated that it was making some horrible buzzing noise. After the following song TMBG's stage manager came out carrying Linnell's red accordion and offered it to him (awww!), but Corn Mo refused, saying that even if his accordion was broken, it was still his baby.

Time for the main event. Has anyone mentioned that the Orff intro is all spiffed up with synchronized lights? It's cornball but oddly thrilling. It also makes Marty Beller appear very godlike, towering above the stage on his platform as the lights flash around him.

Flans played his golden Les Paul on She's an Angel and then switched to his Telecaster before finally taking his ES-335 in hand for Birdhouse. Look, I expect at least three different guitars from Miller during a show, but when Flans starts doing that it makes me nervous. Also, Flans has got Prince on the brain, 'cause this show was at least the third of the last four I've seen in which he mentioned that artist. He said Prince's show is all segues, all medleys of his songs, so that was what They were gonna do.
JL: Medleys of Prince songs.
JF: This next song is off the Dirty Mind album. It's called Sister. And I don't even know how that song goes. [pause] Moving on...here's another song.
JL: This one is from Sign of the Times.
Then they did Spine and performed a very tidy segue into Memo to Human Resources, which astonished me not because it was so beautifully done (which it was), but because Flans's rap actually had a direct link to what was happening in the show.

Before The Guitar Flans once again announced a dance contest. This time the prize was a book on how to play the harmonica, "autographed by the author" (Linnell once again did the honors). Flans told us the book had been "liberated" from the Ann Arbor library but then assured us it had been properly withdrawn.

They played the song. People danced. And hobbitgrrl and her friend won! Aww.

There was quite a lengthy and enlightening introduction to Bastard Wants to Hit Me.
JF: This next song takes place in a parking lot. Why don't you tell them about the song, John?
JL: [in a professorial voice] Well, John, we use a contemporary vocal effect on this song, that we call the recalyzer.
JF: Tell us about the recalyzer.
JL: Well, it's really the secalyzer. [in his normal voice] There is no name for it, actually. It's actually called "pitch correction." We use it on the one song in this show. Not because we're singing out of tune, because we like those parts—
JF: That would be cheating, John.
JL: That would be technically—you might as well go home and listen to your records.
JF: You might as well go home and listen to your Cher records. I'm not talking about Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves, John. The song that was number one while John Lennon's Imagine was number two.
audience: Boo!
JF: That's right. Even from the grave John Lennon is pissed off about that. No, I'm talking about a more contemporary Cher, ladies and gentlemen. The scary Cher.
JL: Okay. So, um, I guess this rap has died utterly, and we should move along.
JF: I got plenty left, John.
JL: Save it for the next song.
JF: No, I wanna talk about this song!

The two confetti cannons were set up and ready, but when They did James K Polk and got to the "expansionist" point, they didn't go off. I was pretty astonished and then thought maybe they were saving the cannons for some other song, but Linnell surprised us all by firing them off on "second term" instead. Possibly he surprised even himself: just as the song ended he said, "Confetti cannon" as if trying to explain something.

Prevenge is sounding better and better. I didn't notice until last Sunday at the Taste that during the bridge part Flans is actually lip-syncing. He doesn't try to be subtle about it either—he stands like a yard back from the mic but keeps moving his lips when he's obviously not singing. It totally cracked me up this time and I'm not sure I'm gonna be able to handle it next time either.

Another segue, Prevenge into Ana Ng. Flans wasn't kidding about those medleys.

Memo to TMBG: please make the Wave stop. Why not play Istanbul instead?

Ditto for Older. Only this time you could play Damn Good Times. Or It's Kickin' In.

Before Drink! Flans said, "I hope it's not too much to ask to just reach out and hold hands with the stranger standing next to you. [pause, to make sure nobody is doing so] Oh. I guess that's—you know, it was good times up until now. I guess I crossed the line that Mr and Mrs Precious Wisconsin can't deal with. You wanted the free love, but you still had the shame, so you needed the drugs."

After Particle Man Linnell mumbled something about having to play that song because Corn Mo's accordion was broken, then they went into The Famous Polka. Wackiness ensued when, during the part when the guitars were supposed to be soloing (duoing?), both Flans and Miller simply continued playing the chords. About halfway through Flans remembered to play a series of single notes instead. He let us play his guitar, then when the song was over he went back over to the extreme stage right corner where there was a small child. His father lifted him up and Flans held the guitar down to him so he could play it too.

Before End of the Tour they did the band intros, with a bluesy jam underneath. Flans introduced Dan Miller on the acoustic guitar and Dan played a little chord over and over and then stopped and waved playfully to get his applause. "Play that note some more," Flans ordered; and he played again and waved again and waited for his applause again. What on earth is happening to Dan Miller? I've never seen him working the crowd like he has been lately.

Flans reminded us that The Spine comes out on Tuesday, and gave props to Dan Miller for having designed the download site. He said, "Unlike all of these other sucker bands, we've held on to our digital rights, and we are now smelling the sweet smell of cashish."

They got ready for Stalk of Wheat and Flans decided to turn his onstage fan off so we could hear better.
JF: So the majesty of the maraca can be captured.
JL: You're gonna hear each little—what are those things inside maracas? We'll have to destroy it in order to find out, that's the problem.
JF: [peering into the maraca] I'm looking inside...oh my god, it's like little portraits of Eisenhower! That is so fucked up!
JL: Wait, no, it's Tom Selleck portraying Eisenhower. That's really fucked up! Where'd you get that maraca?
JF: It was a promotion from TNT. [relieved] Oh, that's why it's Tom Selleck.
JL: No wonder it didn't cost that much.
Dan didn't have his flexatone tonight. And as weird as it has been to see him singing into his own mic, it was even more bizarre to see him at his own mic singing without any instrument at all in front of him.

When they came out for the last encore Flans told us there was a curfew so they had to finish up. Au Contraire was on the setlist but they went straight to Fingertips. And that was the end of another great show.

On our way out of the theater we passed Dan Miller who was at the soundboard packing up his 14" iBook. I stopped (of course) and said hi and asked Dan if they'd be doing Damn Good Times anytime soon. I'd love to hear that. He said they'd soundchecked it a lot but never ended up playing it, and then he asked me if I was done now, if this show was my last. When I told him I still had Minneapolis left, he kinda shook his head and said, "See you there." He will indeed see me there. And I'll let all of you know how the trip goes.