Yay! Found notes for this show. But of course they’re difficult to read and now I can’t remember what I meant when I wrote certain things down.

Rhett Miller did a summer residency at City Winery this summer and I made sure I saw at least one of the shows. I think rtb and I were at the first show of the residency. I would have liked to have gone to more but finances did not allow that.

Opener was comedian Liza Treyger, who was not what I was expecting. Rhett even made a comment about that when he came out. I’m used to him working with comedians who are political but Treyger likes to curse a lot, talk about sex, and insult the audience. There were the jokes about how hard it is for women to get laid but a guy with half a shaved head and a top knot can get laid. Hot women can get away with anything. When women talk about Sex and the City, no one wants to be Miranda but it’s okay to want to be Samantha – who had cancer. She talked about her background – she’s a Russian Jew whose parents emigrated to the US and whose grandparents met at a concentration camp. Somehow she finds the humor in that. Audience members who were lawyers, Bills fans, or from Cleveland were insulted. There was mention of her thighs bleeding because she was wearing a dress. Treyger kept playing with hair and bringing it across her face as if she wanted to hide. There were moments I laughed out loud and others when I felt very uncomfortable for her.

Rhett came out with a beautiful new acoustic guitar and played all of Wreck Your Life because 20 years ago this summer the Old 97’s made that record in Chicago and his manager suggested he do something special for this summer residency. I’ve listed “My Sweet Blue-Eyed Darlin’” as one of the songs performed but then I noted later that Rhett skipped that song because Murry sings it and Rhett doesn’t know the words. So I’m not sure what happened there but I don’t think Rhett sang it. There was a story about “W-I-F-E” and it being an alt-country song but I’m not sure of the significance because I didn’t elaborate in my notes. Afterwards he mixed it up with solo songs and other Old 97’s songs and a couple of new songs coming out on the next Old 97’s album. He smiled when we did the “Yeah!” on “Big Brown Eyes” without any prompting and some of the audience did Murry’s part for “Indefinitely.” “Let’s Get Drunk and Get It On” is sung by Rhett covering Hayes Carll covering the Old 97’s. Rhett says the band does the song as a rave-up but it was written as a sweet love song. Rhett sounded great and there weren’t a lot of stories but, as always, we were left both satisfied and wanting more.

Set List

Victoria
The Other Shoe
Doreen
You Belong to My Heart
Big Brown Eyes
Dressing Room Walls
W-I-F-E
Bel Air
Old Familiar Steam
Over the Cliff
Goin’, Goin’, Gone
Barrier Reef
Nashville
Marina
Rollerskate Skinny
Bad Luck Charm (new song)
Indefinitely
Most in the Summertime
Won’t Be Home
Come Around
Let’s Get Drunk and Get It On
Jesus Loves You But What About Me? (new song)

Encore

Longer Than You’ve Been Alive
Timebomb

By Carene Lydia Lopez