The Verdict:
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Telluride shows fail to match the highs of the Greek run, but it's surprising how dramatically they fail at it. There are a few bright spots here, but for the most part, we're back to the technically precise but uninteresting playing of much of late '09 and early '10.
The first half of the first night's first set features some interesting song choices, but even that novelty disappears in the back half of the set. The playing is precise and fiery throughout, and it's worth noting the number of high-energy S1s the band has managed to string together in a row...but that's all that's worth noting.
Much of the second set continues in the same vein. There's an extended "Sand," but it's all Type I funk-rock (albeit great Type I funk-rock). "Number Line" and "Caspian" get shredded to pieces, and the "Tweezer" is solid, though the highlight of it is the slow segue into "Boogie On." The marquee jam, such as it is, is the "Piper," and though it leans a bit toward the tried-and-now-boring early '09 jamming style, it's a decent excursion, buoyed by the perfectly-placed "Mountains in the Mist" follow-up.
And that's about it for Telluride I. Really.
The Live Review:
8/9/10: First Telluride show kicks off with DwD.
8/9/10: Fast tempo. Fish is a monster.
8/9/10: Camel Walk in the two-slot. Guys having a bit of fun with the vocals.
8/9/10: Ocelot next. Seems sort of like a natural extension of the end of Camel Walk, actually.
8/9/10: Trey combining trilling and the whale during this solo. The efficacy of the results are debatale.
8/9/10: Debatable, even.
8/9/10: Light Up or Leave Me Alone!
8/9/10: Don't think the crowd knows it.
8/9/10: Aww, Summer of '89. What a nice song. I wouldn't mind hearing this live someday. Just
once, though.
8/9/10: Mix seems weird on this SBD. Can hardly hear harmonies. Mike is quiet. Crowd is near-nonexistent.
8/9/10: Sounds like a different mix than the Greek tapes.
8/9/10: Regardless, Stash is next.
8/9/10: Page building some serious tension with pairs of alternating chords on the piano.
8/9/10: Pretty standard-but-intense tension-and-release Stash.
8/9/10: Nothing really breaking the mold early in the show here, but like 8/6 and 8/7 some great
energy and weird-good setlist choices.
8/9/10: Cavern, complete with Trey lyrical gaffes!
8/9/10: Lyrically, Cavern is Trey's great white whale. In terms of guitar lines, it's definitely Sugar Shack.
8/9/10: Don't know why
8/9/10: MUD RAT DETECTORS AND RIBBON REFLECTORS
8/9/10: The Wedge -B Possum.
8/9/10: Setlist is maybe getting a little less interesting, but they're still ripping through the songs like there's no tomorrow.
8/9/10: A really ripping Possum leads into Julius, which (I think) will be the set closer.
8/9/10: S2 starts with what sounded like Trey beginning the Ghost riff, and then Sand drops. That was a little weird.
8/9/10: Nonetheless, friggin' Sand!
8/9/10: Mellow jam space early on, except for Trey playing overtop with a heavily distorted guitar tone.
8/9/10: So many of these songs that just go mega-funky right away now are neat to hear from a few years ago, when that wasn't an assumption.
8/9/10: Rock and roll Sand, with some Mike space-bass.
8/9/10: Extended Sand staying Type I throughout, but damn is it a hot version anyway.
8/9/10: Nothing comes of a little navel-gazing at the end of the song, so instead Trey counts off Number Line.
8/9/10: Troy just absolutely dominated that Number Line. Seriously.
8/9/10: Feedback haze coalesces into Caspian.
8/9/10: Trey is just soloing the song's main melody over and over. Now that's interesting.
8/9/10: I wasn't being sarcastic. He doesn't usually do that.
8/9/10: Neat drone-y section now.
8/9/10: Fish with a sinister, marching beat.
8/9/10: I think Trey was trying for a -> Tweezer there, but got the > instead.
8/9/10: Tweezer jam takes a turn for the funky...Mike takes the lead...and a -> Boogie On!
8/9/10: That was a really patient, premeditated segue. A little rough in execution, but clever.
8/9/10: The Boogie, as usual, is really Mike-centric.
8/9/10: There wasn't really anything developing there with the Boogie On jam, but Trey's > Piper
was still a little jarring.
8/9/10: First few minutes of Piper just straightforward shredding.
8/9/10: Page to the organ at 5:30.
8/9/10: It's a woo jam without woos! So 2010.
8/9/10: Chaotic guitar-loops-and-piano segment.
8/9/10: Ah, ye olde ambient fade-out. So 2009.
8/9/10: Neat last few minutes of that jam, though.
8/9/10: Difference between '10 and '14, though? It took 6-7 minutes of rock noodling to get there.
8/9/10: Ooh! Mountains in the Mist emerging from the mist (of feedback)!
8/9/10: Bowie emerges from the end of Mist.
8/9/10: There is no plan, here, in this setlist for the second set, but the playing is solid across the board.
8/9/10: It sort of reminds me of the feeling I had after 7/16/14.
8/9/10: Page's piano is playing a surprisingly prominent role in this Bowie jam.
8/9/10: A blistering Bowie. A Day in the Life seems like an appropriate follow-up.
8/9/10: Encore'd with Quinn and Tweeprise. Quinn's such a great cover. Glad to hear it.
8/9/10: Overall, the show's all over the map. Incredible energy and great set construction for the first 75% or so.
8/9/10: No improv to really grab onto for more than a minute or two at a time, but plenty of valiant attempts.
8/9/10: Basically, this was an 'average-great' show, but not for lack of effort.
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