Nickel Creek at the Alabama
Last night I went to the Nickel Creek and Howie Day concert at the Alabama Theatre here in Birmingham. This was the first concert I have been to in the Theatre, although I have seen movies there and other programs. This was my first time seeing Nickel Creek and Howie Day, so I was pretty excited. I have been a Nickel Creek fan for a while, and Chris Thile’s solo albums are just outstanding. I had heard bits and pieces of Howie Day, but seeing him perform solo is just unbelievable.
First of all, Howie is just a really strong musician. He plays solo acoustic most of the time, but has a unique method of presenting his music. As he starts into a song, he begins by recording the backing track by looping them through units that allow playback of various loops. He builds up the backing, then starts playing, and usually continues to overdub and modify the loops throughout the song. It was an awesome thing to see.
Nickel Creek came out strong with one of their instrumentals. They played a good mix of songs from their two albums, as well as the solo albums of Sean Watkins and Chris Thile, even throwing in some Radiohead.
The atmosphere of the night was just really mellow, everyone sitting back and enjoying a fine night of music.
October 29th, 2004
I got to see NC perform as Mutual Admiration Society with Glen Phillips at the Bowery Ballroom in NYC. It was the first time I got to see NC perform. While I was a little surprised at how animated(!) Chris was, it really was great to see the band interact with each other. It was a really fun show.
Oh, and you can totally download almost the exact same show for free at archive.org.
October 29th, 2004
Yeah, I have one of the MAS shows from the Bowl at Lime Kiln. I also have a show where NC sat in with Glen on his sets at a small pub in NY, NY.