Neil and band: four guys wanking
by exfanman on 2015-10-08Rogers Arena - VancouverThe opening act was completely lame--a choir and a preacher-like figure all in white, black top and white collar. The second group's lead singer was a bit of a Neil clone and the band's sound was harsh and loud. Before Neil came on, two peasant dressed people come on stage and sowed seeds from a bag for about five minutes. It was a relevant image for two minutes but then became hokey. The best part of the concert for me was Neil playing solo piano and guitar, old songs from the Harvest era. Beautiful. Then the rest of the band joined him and played many for me new songs with lots of political/ecological themes. I'm a Green Party member so appreciate these sentiments, but it was too much of the same. Politics and art are uneasy partners. Finally, after the lyrical section of the songs were finished, the four guitarists jammed for 5-10-15 minutes. I enjoyed these codas for a while but they became cliches--four guys wanking--sounded more or less the same. This was my first arena concert in decades and I'm not inclined to try another one. Maybe Dylan or Leonard. I prefer smaller venues. A women seated in front of us drank 4-5 beers and was obnoxiously drunk and two guys behind us were smoking pot and didn't stop talking.