On with the show…

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/12/2010 (5723 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

After years of steady growth in the concert industry, 2010 will be remembered as the year things cooled down for live entertainment across North America, and Winnipeg was no exception.

The local concert scene was busier than ever, but in 2010, tickets weren’t selling like they used to. This year at the MTS Centre, only teen heartthrob Justin Bieber managed to sell out the downtown rink, despite visits by other big-name acts, including Michael Bublé, Carrie Underwood, Tom Petty, Black Eyed Peas and Iron Maiden.

All those acts attracted healthy crowds and turned a profit, but gone are the days of the automatic sellouts the MTS Centre had been enjoying since opening in late 2004 (take heed, Winnipeg Blue Bombers).

With album sales still declining, more and more artists are turning to concerts to make money, but it appears they’re hitting the well too often; if you saw Tom Petty in 2009 for $100, is seeing him again a year later worth an extra $40? Winnipeggers didn’t think so, and the two stadium shows by the Eagles and Bon Jovi failed to sell out, even when tickets were discounted.

Of course, it wasn’t all doom and gloom on the concert scene. Hip-hop phenom Drake and veteran songwriter/one-time Winnipegger Neil Young both sold out the 2,300 seat Centennial Concert Hall; the Winnipeg Folk Festival, Dauphin’s Countryfest and the Winnipeg Fringe Festival all claimed record crowds; Cirque du soleil was packed; local indie-rock group the Weakerthans sold out three of four shows and there were numerous full bar and theatre gigs.

The demand for live music still exists and, for my dollar, it’s still the best night out of entertainment available. There’s nothing like the thrill of seeing your favourite live band or singer-songwriter, or discovering new music you may have never heard before.

The sheer number of artists hitting the road — playing everywhere from people’s living rooms to football fields — is staggering and it’s impossible to see everything, so consider this list a highly subjective chronological look at some of the best/most memorable shows I’ve seen this year in the city, plus one out-of-town event worth flying to Las Vegas for.

 

 

Guns N’ Roses

Jan. 13, MTS Centre

For their first official shows since releasing the long-awaited Chinese Democracy album in 2008, the current version of Guns N’ Roses chose to tour Canada for some unknown reason, with Winnipeg serving as their first show of the trek. It was a pure spectacle of rock SSRqn’ roll excess, from copious amounts of pyro to a massive lighting rig to a stage shaped like the chalk outline of a dead body that perfectly suited the 25-song, career-spanning marathon by Axl Rose and his eight-member band. The concert even made Spin magazine’s Top 30 Shows of the Year list.

 

The Sadies

May 25, Pyramid Cabaret

At their heart, Toronto’s Sadies are a roots band, but the insanely talented quartet, led by Dallas and Travis Good, can play everything — and they do, throwing in surf music, psychedelia, rock ‘n’ roll and Ennio Morricone-esque spaghetti-western instrumentals into their thrilling mix. And what other bands do 10-song encores? One of the greatest groups making music in Canada today.

 

The Buzzcocks

May 26, Pyramid Cabaret

The Buzzcocks were one of the original British punk groups. Their melodic pop-punk didn’t sound dated in the least as they performed their first two full-length albums from 1978 — Another Music in a Different Kitchen and Love Bites — in their entireties, along with a selection of greatest hits. Original members Pete Shelley and Steve Diggle were in fine form.

 

Hank III

June 12, Pyramid Cabaret

That’s Hank Williams III, son of Hank Williams Jr. and grandson to country pioneer Hank Williams. Williams played a Herculean show over the course of the evening, performing three entirely different sets: an old-school country/honky-tonk set; a “hellbilly” set (rock/country/rockabilly); and a metal set with his side project, Assjack. A night with a diverse crowd that had a little something for everyone.

 

Dixie Chicks

June 22, Canad Inns Stadium

Country group the Dixie Chicks opened for the Eagles, but upstaged the headliners with a powerful one-hour set that proved the trio — Natalie Maines (with a newly shaved head), Emily Robison and her sister Martie Maguire — haven’t lost a step since taking a hiatus four years ago, hitting almost all the touchstones of their 12 years together, from the breezy Wide Open Spaces to the anthemic/defiant Not Ready to Make Nice, proving they have nothing to prove to anyone.

 

Quintron and Miss Pussycat

June 27, Royal Albert

The New Orleans couple constructed a puppet-theatre stage on the Albert’s stage and performed a hilarious (and bloody) puppet show that climaxed with the setup turning into a giant monster before the duo stepped out front and offered up a hot and nasty set of swamp-boogie blues that had everyone in the small crowd of about 100 people dancing, sweating and singing along.

 

The Roots

June 28, Pantages Playhouse Theatre

The Philadelphia hip-hop septet is best known by the masses these days as the house band on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, but they proved to a packed house that their reputation as the world’s greatest live hip-hop group was warranted, with an outrageously funky set that included some out-of-left-field covers of Led Zeppelin, Guns N’ Roses, Gary Glitter and Bo Diddley. And how many hip-hop outfits have a sousaphone as part of their instrumental maelstrom?

 

Tool

July 4, MTS Centre

Making their first appearance in the city since the mid-1990s, the Los Angeles prog-metal band’s concert was intense in every sense of the word, from the throbbing dynamics of the epic pieces to the surreal psychedelic art and videos by guitarist Adam Jones. The concert of the year for many who saw this mind-warping spectacle of sight and sound.

 

High on Fire

July 13, Royal Albert

After opening for numerous bands over the years, High on Fire finally got its chance to headline and showed why it is considered one of best bands in metal today, with a set that combined elements of speed, thrash, sludge, stoner rock and blues inside a steaming hot Albert. When it comes to power trios, High on Fire might be the most powerful of them all.

 

Neil Young

July 26, Centennial Concert Hall

The always unpredictable 64-year-old icon brought his Twisted Road solo tour to town for two nights, delivering slightly altered versions of some of his old hits, quiet acoustic moments and a heavy helping of songs from the then-unreleased album Le Noise, a barrage of distortion, looped effects and atmospheric noise that rumbled through the theatre. Was the 90-minute set worth the top price of $250? If you were a die-hard fan, it was. On the flip side — $250? Really? That’s a little much, don’t you think, Mr. Young?

 

Flaming Lips

Sept. 21, Burton Cummings Theatre

One of the greatest live bands in the world lived up to its billing in a show that resembled the best New Year’s Eve party ever, with confetti canons, giant balloons, lasers, local dancers dressed as DJ Lance Rock from children’s show Yo Gabba Gabba and challenging, inventive music that veered from experimental psychedelic freakouts to feel-good melodic pop. Stunning, euphoric and simply mind-blowing.

 

Arcade Fire

Sept. 23, MTS Centre

The celebrated eight-piece Montreal rock group cast aside any doubts about their transformation into an arena band with a sound so big it could have filled a venue twice the size. Every song featured different instrumentation and the energy level was almost always red-lining. One of the biggest surprises? That this show by arguably one of Canada’s most famous bands attracted fewer than 6,000 people. A bonus was opening act Calexico, whose dusty Tex-Mex anthems and cosmic psychedelia benefited from a perfect sound mix that allowed the subtle nuances of their material to be heard throughout the building, even if it wasn’t as intimate as their past local club shows.

 

Slash

Sept. 24, Burton Cummings Theatre

Former Guns N’ Roses axe-slinger Slash and his new band, featuring Winnipegger Brent Fitz on drums, offered up an old-school, kick-ass, rock SSRqn’ roll show that rewarded one of the most enthusiastic audiences of the year. The entire crowd was so into the set, which featured material from throughout the top-hat-wearing guitarist’s career — including songs from GNR, Velvet Revolver and his new solo album — the building practically moved on its foundations. Having seen Slash in every one of his bands (with the exception of Slash’s Snakepit), this was the best I’ve ever seen him and he appeared to be enjoying himself as much as the audience.

 

Josh Ritter

Oct. 28, West End Cultural Centre

The Idaho singer-songwriter with the mile-wide smile charmed a full house with a crack band that fabulously fleshed out his literate folk-rock tunes. The set list ran the gamut from raucous rave-ups to sweet sing-alongs (one conducted entirely in the dark), but whatever the tone or tempo, Ritter always appeared to be having the time of his life — as did the audience.

— Jill Wilson

 

Matador at 21 Lost Weekend

Oct. 1-3, Las Vegas

Influential New York indie-rock label Matador Records celebrated its 21st anniversary with a three-day festival at the Palms Hotel in Sin City that ranks as one of the greatest musical weekends of my life, with sets by the likes of Sonic Youth, Pavement, F

-d Up, Superchunk, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, Yo La Tengo, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Cat Power, Guitar Wolf, Girls, Chavez, Spoon, Liz Phair and a reunited Guided By Voices, to name just a few.

 

 

Weakerthans

Dec. 15-18, various venues

Local indie-rock faves the Weakerthans took on the heroic task of playing each of their albums on successive nights at different venues, culminating with a performance of all four in reverse chronological order at the Burton Cummings Theatre. The shows attracted music fans to the city from Europe, Japan and the United States.

 

rob.williams@freepress.mb.ca