August 10, 2007
Review by Andrew Mccallum
I don't know what it is about Wellington, but as in 2003 Bob put on
a stellar performance. Maybe it's because Wellington is a city full
of committed musos - who knows? The thing that was different
from Christchurch was that the audience was "on" from before the
show even started, and so Bob was "on" as well. Highlights - Lay Lady Lay
was very seductive. My back Pages was intense with a three note riff on
the harp to close it out. Nettie Moore was beautifully sung and tonights
Ballad of a Thin Man ranked among the great performances of this song
with a committed harp to finish off. Bob was in fine voice and sang very
carefully throughout. Denny was really doing the business tonight and
got 4 or 5 cheers after solos.
It was a great concert. Christchurch was a 5 and half. This was a 10.
Andrew
Review by Robert
I'm not sure that I went to the same gig as the one reviewed by Andrew
Mccallum. What an appalling night! I'm not blaming Bob for this - I'm
sure he was great and certainly both him and the band put plenty of effort
into the performance and seemed to enjoy themselves. It's the Westpac
Arena that needs to be ashamed of themselves. The sound was excruciating.
The mix was so bad that it was only by track four ('Lady, Lady, Lay) that
I even recognized what the song was! The first three songs were just
muffled nonsense. The venue had mixed Bob's voice in such a way that if he
sang louder than the faintest of vocal the voice would just level out into
one even pitched blur.
The first song in which you could hear any of the great subtleties of
Bob's voice was "When the deal goes down" and that's because the volume of
the band was lower. The same can be said for Nettie Moore. It took 2
minutes before I recognized 'Tangled up in blue" (one of my all time
favorites).
Probably the highlights were the encores. Maybe this was because it was
then that you realized it was all coming to an end and so he would
unfortunately be gone soon.
Looking around me I could tell plenty felt the same - Ok everyone was in
the presence of 'genius' so gave him the rapturous applause between songs
that you would expect. But during the actual performance many a face
looked around and didn't concentrate in a manner that you would expect if
they could actually hear those sublime lyrics.
So Bob - please come back to Wellington but avoid that venue with a barge
pole.
Robert
Comments by David Finley
Nice to see Bob playing guitar again, and he was on great form with his
harmonica solos. His singing was the best I'd heard for a few years. Set
list was predictable, but all that aside, a fabulous show, both Bob and
the crowd were in top form. We really appreciated the tribute to our
breezy city when he played 'Blowin In The Wind' as the final encore. Come
back soon Bob, don't be a stranger!
David Finley
Wellington
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