JEFF TWEEDY @ The Vic Theater

I just don't have the brain on to write anything tonight. Luckily for me, a Pimp named Nick sent me a burn (gratis, no less!) of a solo show from Wilco's Jeff Tweedy at The Vic Theater in Chicago. I'll try to let this stuff speak for itself.

The show took place on March 3, 2005 -- mere blocks from my apartment -- but I was just too broke to get tickets. It wasn't until a Yo La Tengo show a few weeks later that I'd finally get to see a show at The Vic. Hell of a place to see a show. Get there early and sit in the balcony like a god.

Since a lot of the first disc is riddled with static, I'm just featuring tracks from the encore. Luckily, an encore at a Tweedy show is typically just as long as the set. Actually, I just looked at the setlist and it is exactly that: 17 songs for the set, 17 songs for the encore (which included a bunch of Uncle Tupelo songs, along with two Dylan covers and a Randy Newman song).

Here's that part of the setlist, with a few links to tracks for your enjoyment:

Tweedy Encores -- The Vic Theater -- 3/5/05

1. Gun
2. We've Been Had
3. Candyfloss
4. Henry & the H Bombs
5. Acuff Rose
6. I'm the Man Who Loves You
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7. Misunderstood
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8. Laminated Cat (w/Glenn, Wilco's drummer)
9. The Family Gardener (w/Glenn, Pat, Mike and Pat from Wilco) This song, co-written by Scott McCaughey, is from the MINUS 5 album "Down With Wilco." Love the lyrics on this one; they remind me of The Kinks:

The family garden is a special place
In sun and shade there, I was raised
But voices fade away and rooms are rearranged
Now I'm the family gardener

You need a stethoscope and a good good rake
Some beer for snails and a rope for snakes
A flowerbed to fall in as the moonlight breaks
When you're the family gardener
And I'm the family gardener

As I look down with my two eyes and my two green thumbs
I despise the people who walk on the green green grass
I grew with my watered love

Now some other son sleeps in the southern wing
And someone else's mother sits to paint the pastoral scene
My father always said that I would never amount to anything
But I'm the family gardener
I'm the family gardener

10. How to Fight Loneliness (rest of songs feature all of Wilco minus Nels)
11. John Wesley Harding
12. Political Science
13. Hummingbird
14. The Late Greats
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15. Passenger Side
16. California Stars
17. I Shall be Released

I can't believed I've lived in Chicago for two and a half years and never had a public Tweedy sighting. Saw John plenty of times... but no Tweedy. My life is incomplete.