November 7, 2004

It was the 3rd & final night of Paul Westerberg & the Painkillers run at the prestigeous gorgeous roomy Pantages Theater & I somehow made the scene. Strangely, I was in need of a religious experience & what I got was some latter day Jim Morrison Replacements hazy crazy style. My favorite moment was when Paul launched himself (almost using the mic stand like a pole vault) into the front row with his guitar then piledriving into ’Mats anthem “I Will Dare” & subsequently igniting the lame sleeper crowd spring them to life like a mutant vudu priest. He never lost the crowd after that arguably as he went dark & unpredictable toward the end with macabe suicide stories & a few ruthlessly smashed guitars (nice ones too). Well, I aknowledgedly understand rock & roll guitars sometimes need to be sacrificed to the gawds just like many of us are called to take one for some well meaning team or another. Here I’d like to give props to my friend Tim Fitch for his on stage guitar tech duties namely catching all of PW’s guitars that were flung after each song prompting some quick thinking grabs including some one handed stretchs.


FITCH