mtroads

The Watchmen are back. No, I’m not talking about the graphic novel or the film adaptation due in theatres in March (although I’m pretty excited about that as well). I’m talking about the 90’s Alt-Rock band from Winnipeg. This really isn’t big news for most people, but The Watchmen were one of those bands on my list of artists I missed seeing live before they broke up/moved onto something else/died. These days, that list consists mostly of The Ramones, Run DMC, Poor Old Lu, The Lassie Foundation, Moxy Fruvous… ok, maybe not Moxy Fruvous but until yesterday The Watchmen were on that list.

I was a little late getting into the band. It wasn’t really until Silent Radar was released that I really started listening and even then, it wasn’t until early 2001 that I spun that disc, a lot, as my college roommate, Joel can attest. I must’ve listened to that for about a month straight. Stereo was my wake song in the mornings and it was my background music as I surfed Napster for bootlegs and rarities of my favourite bands. Anyways, it wasn’t too long afterwards that Slomotion was released and it was announced that the band was breaking up. Which was really too bad because the new material on Slomotion was some of their best material, even if there was no drummer.

Anyways, I heard the Watchmen were reuniting for a couple of shows this, so I was hoping to get to see them. Unfortunately, I didn’t hear about this until after the shows had sold out. The only sign of tickets on the secondary market were people looking to swap days and a handful of people like me, looking for a way in. By the end of last week, I had pretty much given up hope of seeing them in this batch of shows when I heard they’d be playing a tailgate party for a Maple Leafs’ pre-season game. I was pretty excited about this because this meant it was a free show and I didn’t have to worry about paying someone scalping the tickets more money than I paid to see Radiohead a couple months ago. But I still had my reservations. How long would they play for since it was a free show? Would they even care about this show and just be mailing it in? What good rock show starts at 5:45 that’s not at a giant outdoor festival? Well, we’ll get to those in a couple seconds.

I showed up to the tailgate party around 5:30 and kind of wandered around. After helping myself to some free Coke Zero and wandering by the Calder, Jennings, Vezina and Conn Smythe trophies, I siddled up to the stage. I was shocked that no one else had congregated there so close to show time. With the demand for tickets for the weekend shows, why hadn’t people come out to this free event? Anyways, I enjoyed my solitary site (there was no one within a six foot radius of me) and in a couple minutes the band came out and launched into the classic Boneyard Tree. After a couple songs I was joined by Andy and Brad and we proceeded to see them rock out for the next hour. Eventually they got the crowds attention but no one would come within 20 feet of the stage, but some of that could be attributed to the volume. My ears are still ringing a little, which is surprising, given that it was an outdoor show.

Anyways, the band was super tight and looked like they were having a lot of fun. They definitely looked older and fatter but brought the rock as they belted out hits spanning their catalogue from Run and Hide and Wiser to Any Day Now and Absolutely Anytime. The old songs were energetic with bassist Ken Tizzard supplying most of the stage presence (might have to steal some of those moves for my own performance in a couple days) and the newer stuff was adapted well when played with the live drummer. After playing for a little over an hour, they ended with Stereo as Danny Greaves had to head inside the Air Canada Centre to sing the national anthems before the hockey game. They left out a couple of their slower hits but that can be excused given that the whole goal of the gig was to energize the crowd (not sure Brighter Hell or Soft Parade could’ve accomplished that).

I was hoping that this would serve as a good replacement for aforementioned shows on the weekend that I would be unable to get to, but if anything, it’s made me more disappointed that I wouldn’t be seeing them in such a small, tight venue as the Legendary Horseshoe Tavern.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008 at 6:45 am, and is filed under Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.