[This is (maybe) an ongoing series looking at older and newer gigs by my band The Wolf Tones, which places a strong emphasis on improvisation and does not pick a setlist in advance... so why did we play these songs this time? Let us explore...]
My prediction was mostly accurate.
Playing a bunch of closely-grouped gigs in the past couple weeks had us primed to form like Voltron and put together a strong set for Allegheny City Brewing's Post-Pedal-PGH Party. It wasn't a big jam-fest, likely because we didn't run fully plugged like I was anticipating.
But that just offered more opportunities to listen closely to each other and create in new ways. We ended up blending a good deal of reggae into this setlist, which I'm all for. I got a chance to do a Lee "Scratch" Perry cover, which is not something I would've thought possible a few years ago. Let's run it down:
Early set: Crawdad Song, Way Down in the Hole > Sweet Heaven When I Die, Salty Dog Blues, Don't Let Go, Keep On Moving, Tipitina > Fishing in the Dark, Georgia On a Fast Train
This set turned out to be a good general mix of what you get at a Wolf Tones gig: An old-school bluegrass opener, followed by the theme from HBO's "The Wire" that gets jammed into another old trad tune, followed by jam-band grooves, a reggae song, some Professor Longhair, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Billy Joe Shaver.
For me, the unexpected set highlight was "Don't Let Go," a Jessie Stone tune that jam-band fans know from Jerry Garcia Band setlists. I'm honestly not sure why I even have it in the tablet... it rides on that Bo-Diddley-type rhythm that doesn't really hit the right way without a drummer. We've done it once or twice, trying to speed it up, and it just didn't work the way we'd hoped. So this time, I figured let's just try the OG tempo, and our bassist Kyle came in with some nimble little bass runs that augmented that Bo Diddley feel and kept us grooving at a slower speed. We worked the jam up and down, energy-wise, and it turned out much cooler than I anticipated.
Yet again, I was not able to establish the right tempo for "Fishing in the Dark," and it was a lyrical race to the finish. Dammit.
Bob Marley's "Keep On Moving" has become a reliable vehicle for jamming over the past handful of gigs. There are a good number of reggae tunes that kinda just work the 1 and 4 chords the whole time, and that leaves a lot of open space for musical fun. I would work that same structure in the late set to sneak a bonus reggae tune into the setlist. To wit:
Late set: Traveling Mood, Raleigh & Spencer > Soul Fire > Raleigh & Spencer, Big River, Tulsa Time > 9 to 5 > 54-46 Was My Number, Columbus Stockade Blues, High On a Mountain, Money > Bananas & Blow, Sittin' On Top of the World
More Dr. John!! I gotta pick and choose Dr. John covers carefully. Back in my electric-band days, we did "Gris-Gris Gumbo Ya Ya" a good bit, and there's a real fine line between capturing that eerie swamp vibe and just doing a bad caricature of Dr. John. But he's got plenty of stuff in the repertoire, including "Traveling Mood," that has the potential to be countrified or grassed up.
"Raleigh & Spencer" is always fun, and I was able to sneak my Scratch Perry cover, "Soul Fire," into the middle. I mainly picked this song for the line "Soul fire, and we ain't got no water," and now I'm wondering if Rockmaster Scott & the Dynamic Three heard this song and cribbed part of that line, which of course led to the only Bloodhound Gang most people know.
Archie finally gave me a break from singing lead and took the reins for "Big River," and then it was off into one of my favorite new tunes we've been doing, Don Williams' "Tulsa Time." I thought it would lead nicely into a quick key change and then our Dolly Parton tribute, "9 to 5." Joe wanted to take a break between the two... and then when it came time to do that, he changed his mind, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise... it gave me time to realize that, for the second show in a row, I thought I put the chart in the tablet and didn't, and had to look up the lyrics on my phone. Dammit. ("Dammit" is turning out to be a common theme for me during this gig.)
While we were doing number-based songs in the key of A, I swiped the tablet over to Toots & the Maytals' "54-46 Was My Number," which follows the same 1-4 structure as "Keep On Moving"... and, as it turns out, the same structure as Bob Marley's "Bend Down Low," which we also tossed in for good measure before circling back to Toots for a reprise.
You already know about "Columbus Stockade Blues" by now. This was a standard version, nice little 3:30-minute banger.
We took a rare request and did an old trad tune, "High On a Mountain." I whiffed a little at the outset because it's a pretty high vocal lead, and at least once things got a little froggy, but it turned out alright.
Back to reggae! This time it wasn't me being pushy. We put a hypnotic spin on Cornell Campbell's "Money," doing a little manual dub-echo work on guitar. I almost prefer doing the "dub" effect manually as opposed to my tape-delay pedal. The jam worked up into my first chance to cover a tune that Nemo usually sang, Ween's "Bananas & Blow." It's super-dumb and super-fun. Was it entirely appropriate for a Sunday afternoon on East Ohio Street in the North Side? Who could say for certain? I know at least a few people were singing along... "Stuck in my cabana, livin' on bananas and bloooooow..."
We rounded out the set with Joe singing "Sittin' On Top of the World" and introducing the band with everyone taking a quick solo.
I've kind of resisted talking about my guitar breaks on here, because quite frankly, I'm not very proud of them. I've managed to scrape together a decent few pickin' lines on a trad tune like this, but I don't take breaks in either of the bands I'm in. I much prefer to be a rhythm guitarist who slides in and out with little solo lines or new musical ideas. On a slower tune like "Walking On the Moon" or "Money," I have the confidence to try and take a break, but bluegrass breaks are too fast for me. We were movin' at too many BPMs for me to play anything good, so I resorted to whistling, which I am very good at. If only I could make the guitar do that.
One thing I also haven't actually done that much is talk about how we're picking the next song, and it's really situation-dependent. For example, "Raleigh & Spencer" is in the key of A, and we usually end up doing a big fat jam in the middle before circling back for the final verse or two. All I had to do was push the jam into A-minor territory and bring up "Soul Fire" on the tablet. We'd never played it before, but I started bringing the dynamics down, started doing some reggae guitar chukking and we were good to go.
Sometimes I'll hear Joe or Archie play a lick or a line that reminds me of another tune, and I'll start wondering how close that song is in terms of keys. If we're playing in E-minor, for example, it's easy to make a quick transition to D, A or G. I don't know the music-theory terminology for it, but it sounds very natural to transition to any of those keys, and that opens up the songbook to literally hundreds of options.
When we were nearing the end of late set and playing "Money," I knew I wanted to do "Bananas & Blow" at some point. "Money"'s chord structure is just Am and G, so I cued everyone to hold on G for a second, then move down to E-minor, and just like that, we're in position to play some Ween.
It's a fun puzzle to solve, and even more fun when we can pull it off seamlessly.
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