Average White Band – Rams Head on Stage, 4/20/2017

 

Table 103, Row A, Seat 2 (front row of tables, center stage)

Absolutely amazing 90-minute high-energy show by a band I’ve liked since my college days (not everyone shared my opinion) but had never seen live. “A Love Of Your Own”, 5 songs in, featured a wonderful sax solo by Cliff Lyons, and sounded like the kind of performance most bands would save for the end of their main set. All 7 musicians were great, including founding members Alan Gorrie and Onnie McIntyre, but I was especially impressed by lead vocalist Brent Carter, who’s one of the best soul singers I’ve heard in my many years of concert-going. Naturally, the evening ended with a rousing audience-participation version of “Pick Up The Pieces”. This may have been my first AWB show, but I doubt that it will be my last.

 

Setlist

April 16, 2017 – Nationals 6, Phillies 4 – Nationals Park

http://m.nationals.mlb.com/news/article/224665428/bryce-harper-hits-walkoff-home-run-in-ninth/

 

Attendance: 29,774

Game Time: 3:11

Weather: 84 degrees, partly cloudy

Wind: 15 mph

Umpires: Home Plate - Greg Gibson, First Base - Jerry Layne, Second Base - Dan Bellino, Third Base - Mike Estabrook

 

Notes – classic ending, as Harper erased Philadelphia’s one-run lead with two outs and two on in the ninth with his fourth career walk-off HR … Phils second-baseman Cesar Hernandez led off the game with a homer for the second time this season … Nats tied things up quickly in the bottom of the inning on doubles by Eaton and Rendon, and took the lead in the third when with two outs Rendon beat out an infield single and Harper hit the next pitch out of the park … Gio held the Phils down until the 8^th, when they tied it up in an inning featuring 3 singles, a Jayson Werth error in left field and a Koda Glover wild pitch … bullpen problems continued in the 9^th, when Aaron Altherr doubled off Treinen and subsequently scored on two infield grounders … 10:30 departure from Rockville met with relatively light traffic, a good parking spot, and still-available autograph vouchers … had shade in our regular seats for almost the entire game, nice on an unusually hot April day … the Easter Bunny shed his nice-guy image with a vicious take-down of Teddy during the Presidents Race

Owen Danoff – AMP, 4/15/2017

As our party of four had “VIP” tickets, we got great seats (front row of tables, in the center). Owen had the same two bandmates as at the November show I attended, but this one was somewhat longer (about 75 minutes) and included a few new songs, which were good enough that I forgave him for not performing “Hometown Headstone”. In addition to the opening “(If I Had A) Starship” (after which he expressed disappointment that so few of us had yet seen the recently-released trailer for the upcoming Star Wars movie), and the usual solo take on “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right”, highlights included 3 great covers: Leonard Cohen’s classic “Hallelulah”, Van Morrison’s “Crazy Love” (which I hadn’t heard in quite a while), and a kick-ass version of Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” as the first encore.