meltdown, london 20/06/07

Thought I'd start a thread for the Meldtown gig at the Royal Festival Hall.
I'm really looking forward to the gig on Wednesday night, looking forward to hearing a bunch of Weirdness songs. I can't quite imagine how the usually staid and seated RFH will cope with the Stooges...
If you're also going, have a great time and stick a report on this site when you get home.
Cheers,
Richard

I'll post mine next week, after they'v played in sweden

Well what can I say?

The Stooges put on a terrific show last night, as expected. The sound was excellent in the newly refurbished Royal Festival Hall, much better than at their last London show (the Funhouse gig at Hammersmith in 2005). Ron's guitar was superb, as usual, Scott's drumming was incredible, as always, and Mike's bass playing was wondrous (how does he play so furiously?). Steve Mackay's sax could have been a bit louder in the mix, as he added sax to everything from "1970" onwards, and that included a bunch of Weirdness songs that he doesn't play on on the studio recordings. They sound a lot better with him!

The only problem I have with what I saw last night was that some of the spontaneity seems to have gone. The set list was virtually identical to all the others played since the Stooges reformed, with the addition of a handful of Weirdness songs after "Skull Ring". Now I'm perfectly happy to see and hear the old stuff, I love it so much, but I couldn't help feeling that it would have been better to have mixed the old and the new a bit more, and maybe include a few more new songs, especially the slower Weirdness tracks which would have added a little more contrast to the gig.

The only other slightly worrying point was that Iggy's limp seems to have worsened considerably. He still manages to throw himself about the stage like in the old days and dived into the crowd twice during "Dog" but when not gyrating and thrashing around he seems to have quite some trouble walking, and stands very awkwardly as his left hip appears to be twisted all wrong.

Having said that Iggy appeared to be having a ball - dousing himself with water and beer, rolling around the stage, lounging between the monitors at the front while the rest of the band had gone off stage, diving onto Scott's drum kit (which appeared to piss Scott off somewhat) and generally grinning broadly at every opportunity. He repeated the "We're very happy to be here... well, we're very happy to be anywhere!" comment again, but as it's such a good line, and so clearly heartfelt and true I don't mind hearing it again.

So - a really great Stooges gig, probably not the best show I've seen them do, but wonderful fun, Iggy on very good form, clearly having a great time putting on a great show. Hell, what more do you want from a bunch of 60 year olds!

Set list -
Loose,
Down On The Street,
Dog,
1969,
TV Eye,
Dirt,
Real Cool Time,
No Fun,
1970,
Fun House / LA Blues,
Skull Ring,
I'm Fried,
Trollin',
She Took My Money,
Not Right,
Little Electric Chair.

That's from memory, so a couple of songs might be in the wrong order, but I'm pretty sure that's what was played.

Was anyone else there?

Cheers,

Richard

I agree it was an excellent show the sound was wonderful, crystal clear not as loud & harsh as the Hammersmith show but still very loud.

Iggy was definitely having fun, a few more new songs would have been nice. Why no 'My Idea of fun' ?. They were selling the t'shirt in the foyer, which i bought.

They did 'Mindroom' aswell.

Great night.

Nigel.

Yeah, where was "My Idea Of Fun" - that one always works well in concert.
"Mindroom" - I forgot that one, but it's kind of part of "1970" isn't it?
Cheers,
Richard

Sorry to be so late joining this thread but I've only just signed up. Anyway, here goes.
I thought the sound was poor and the audience reaction was not as wild as usual. The stage invasion was funny though. A few people in suits dancing on stage always does it for me
The upside of an inhibited crowd is that Iggy always tries harder. That was probably why he broke a bottle on the mike stand near the end. That reminds me of another funny thing, whenever the stage got wet a little man ran on with a towel to mop it up

I agree with Richard's points about the set order. It would have been better to mix it up more but I guess the set is designed for maximum impact so maybe Iggy felt the new songs didn't fit in earlier. I also thought he was limping rather a lot but I'm watching Escaped Maniacs at the moment and he is really limping in that too.

In all not the best Stooges gig I've been to this year but probably better than V. I put it down to playing in a seated venue.

yeh iggy had cartilage removed from his knee, thats y he limps

He never looks like he's in pain from it but it does twist his body more than looks healthy.

yeh, he can do those moves, esp the kinda stuff he did in the lates 60s and early 70s, because he was a swimmer, and is into those tai chi and qui qong type stuff also had a spell of ballet lessons in the mid to late 80s, or early 90s i think