"A letter from Roel relating the adventures of two old friends and their guitars. Sounds like they went down well."
"A letter from Roel relating the adventures of two old friends and their guitars. Sounds like they went down well."
Having seen the first gig of this Crosby & Nash tour at the Paradiso in Amsterdam, I was really looking forward to seeing them again in De Melkweg. I can’t think of a better place to see these two guys perform than these two beautiful and intimate venues. The show started unusually early at 19:30, whereas the other shows of this tour typically started at 20:00 or later. Before the show started we heard that De Melkweg had strongly pressed the band that there was a 10 o’clock curfew (we were told there were even notes backstage stating this curfew). The show ended at 20 past 10, so apparently they didn’t really care.
De Melkweg is a small venue. The stage is pretty narrow (the band just about fit on it), there’s a small floor, with two-step-high platformsall around it, and a small balcony above that. I guess that the roomholds about 1000 people, if that. The room was packed at 19:30, and they started playing 5 minutes after that. The setlist was similar to the Paradiso setlist, with a few surprises thrown in. Some of those surprises were Broken Bird, Page 43 and Orleans.
Croz and Nash were very chatty all night, and said to be very happy to be back in Amsterdam again, where people speak English and understand what they’re saying on stage, as opposed to the Italian, Spanish and French crowds. None of the jokes were lost on the crowd at De Melkweg! Highlights of the evening were an amazing Broken Bird (well done!), a rocking Puppeteer, an incredible Wooden Ships, and a very, very emotional version of Delta. This last song was incredible, with the Croz explaining about the times when he wrote the song, and was clearly emotional during the first few notes of the song.Dean Parks lay down an incredible guitar solo during the song (Crosby thanked him afterwards), possibly the best guitar work I’ve seen Parks do on the C&N shows.
rosby’s son James Raymond also did an awesome piano solo on Delta, itwas sheer beauty. Wooden Ships was magical. The band members were allreally enjoying the evening, and they were smiling at each other theentire show. The show ended with a singalong session on Our House and then Almost Cut My Hair. The last joke of the evening was Crosby playing that "Mr.Tambourine Man" riff on his acoustic 12-string. He’s done that since 1973, but I never get tired of it.
Apparently Nash does, he replied with "Oh, fuck you, Croz!". Then Nash encouraged the crowd to help himpersuade Crosby to play Mr. Tambourbine Man for once, but he replied: "I only know the harmonies!". Finally, another singalong on Teach Your Children. I think there wasn’t anyone who didn’t sing along, and theband really enjoyed that.Then the tour ended. Crosby and Nash thanked all band members a lot, thanked the nice audience, bowed, and left. This is a show I’ll never forget.–
Roel – rdvdijk@rustradio.org