July 2, 1999 -

Reviews by...
Rich N.
Chris
Mark
Jess
John
Jill

Fletcher's nightclub in Fells Point:

      1.Dr. Bernice 
      2.Been Around World 
      3.Eurotrash Girl 
      4.Lonesome Johnny Blues 
      5.100 FPM 
      6.Useless Stuff 
      7.Shiner 
      8.Seven Days 
      9.Big Dipper 
     10.Teen Angst 
     11.Sweet Thistle Pie 
     12.Pictures of Matchstick Men 
     13.When I Win the Lottery 
     14.The Good Life 
     15.Take Me Down to the Infirmary 
     16.Mr. Wrong 
     17.Trials & Tribulations 
     18.(The Courtney Cox Story) Sweet Home Alabama 
     19.Low 
 

David was quite talkative, giving his view on Cracker's role as a bar band (don't listen to the lyrics....just have some beers and talk to your friends..), a $1 million Courtney Cox wedding the band almost played at, and how to request songs ("don't say 'Low'; we're not dumb assess" , "if you yell out 'Camper', you gotta shout out the song, too")

Sweet Home Alabama was real treat. Just as it seemed they'd ditch out after a few bars, they really launched into a faithful version, complete w/ guitar and keyboard solos.

Mr. Wrong seemed out-of-place. Good to hear Good Life and Useless Stuff.

David made sure to inform everyone in advance about the bar's music curfew, thus no encore.

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Jess, John, Jill & I survived the drive back from Baltimore and are now on our way out to go down to the Kill Devil Hills show. The Fletcher's show was indeed full of surprises & a lot of fun. This review is sort of a rough draft...I think there will be stuff we think of later. We're sorta in the thick of things here. The set list per Jessica:

      1.Dr. Bernice 
      2.Been Around the World 
      3.Eurotrash Girl 
      4.Lonesome Johnny Blues 
      5.100 FPM 
      6.Useless Stuff 
      7.Shiner Song 
      8.7 Days 
      9.Big Dipper 
     10.Teen Angst 
     11.Sweet Thistle Pie 
     12.Pictures of Matchstick Men 
     13.When I Win the Lottery (BIG highlight) 
     14.The Good Life 
     15.Take Me Down to the Infirmary 
     16.Trials & Tribulations 
     17.Mr. Wrong 
     18.Low(started, stopped & then David started into a story about Courtney Cox's million dollar Wedding
        and how the band was originally suppose to play for $5000 (or .5% of the total wedding budget )
        Johnny commented that the salmon guy got offered more than they did) to play it) and Drum roll
        please.... 
     19.Sweet Home Alabama (Johnny lead vocals!) 
     20.and then they finished with Low(take 2) 
 

While hearing 'Lottery' was a really big deal & a great surprise it was overshadowed by the impromtu rendition of Lynyrd Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama....

David did a lot more talking during the show than he normally does... he even took requests!!! He insisted that the folks shouting out the CVB requests not just say "Camper Van Beethoven" but instead should name the song correctly and the album it is from album. Along with mentioning Courtney Cox's wedding & how she is really just a white trash girl.... he stated to the crowd that they should'nt treat the show like a Wilco concert by trying to analyze the lyrics--or to quote David: 'F*ck that S*it.' David directed this comment towards the 'newcomers' in the audience.

a lot of C2kers got a chance to chat w/ the band afterwards...so cool.

we will write more later....

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The biggest surprise of the Fletcher's show in Baltimore, MD tonight was not the fact Cracker opened with Dr. Bernice. It was not the fact that they pulled out a Take Me Down to the Infirmary, nor the Useless Stuff they played at the request of some really annoying drunken guy. The first When I Win the Lottery in years could not top what was yet to come. The absolute biggest surprise of the night was to hear Johnny Hickman do lead vocals on Lynyrd Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama.

The afternoon was full of surprises for me personally though. I was walking accross to check out the harbour when all of a sudden I heard someone ask if my name was Mark. I replied in the affirmative, and to my surprise, and delight, Nancy re-introduced herself. I followed her inside the restaurant she and Karen were eating in, and had my drink of choice, a cold Coke Classic. When the ladies had finished their meals, we went out to look at some of the nearby shops. It was at about this time that I told them David, Bob, and Johnny had come out of the vegetarian grill up the street earlier, and I had asked David if he would play Happy Birthday to Me this evening. We went to the grill to check out menu.

A little after this, we saw Jude, and his band unloading their equipment. Nancy had to make a phone call, and I ended up helping with some of the more heavy shit. Fast forward a few hours, after all of the c2k'ers have arrived. They opened the doors quite a bit late, and finally after about an hour wait, Jude took the stage to a packed house. If you've never been to Fletcher's, this might seem like an easy feat. But no, there would have to be at least fifteen people there to be packed.

Jude was really much better than the single he has on the radio. I was certainly impressed. I will allow jill to tell her story about this night, only because I might mess up some of the details.

Alas. Cracker takes the stage a few minutes past 11:30, and break into what has now become a favorite of mine, Dr. Bernice. A rousing rendition that exiceted the crowd enough to make Johnny smile. The show was full of surprises, as Kenny and Frank would find out. To quote David, "I just told Frank to play a reggae beat." Certainly not the average Cracker song.

I will also let Jess post the setlist. They played most of the favorites, and at one point, even declared that it was going to be requests for the rest of the night.

Perhaps the best moment for me was when Johnny had me accompany him for a rendition of "Happy Birthday To Me." Nancy had given him a harmonica, and he was testing it out, and broke into that song, remembering me from before, he pointed to me for some of the lyrics, and I just sang. Out of tune as I was, I don't think anyone noticed. did I mention this was in the parking lot outside of the show? No? good. I'll leave it that way.

Also, as the title suggests, there was some rain. But none that got inside the building. I asked Mr. Hickman about playing asatr, and he said next tour.. though when that will be, no one knows for sure.

I'm out.

-Mark

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Comments... It was great meeting up w/ the tons of the C2K east coast division. =) The bathroom at Fletchers was very interesting. Plastered with old record album covers of 60s, 70s, and 80s teen idols.. and Simon and Garfunkel were up there as well =) (don't mind me, I'm just totally psyched to see Paul in concert w/ Bob Dylan in a bit over a week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) Um... when we got up to the club we realized that, the place was, in fact, absolutely TINY. I mean, Cracker had more room to spread out on stage at their Moondance practice show back in May of 98! Same goes for fan capacity.... Um... the only people standing between us and the stage were some Jude fans (Jude being the opening act) and they promised to leave their choice spots after Jude. =) That was nice of them. =) I sincerely hope Jill tells her Jude story soon as it is an awesome story I''m sure she's gonna be proud to tell. =) Now back to the show....

Jude came on and played a while, and he was very good. Not exactly what I would buy, but very listenable and all that. He has some nice lyrics, and occasionally he sings very high... =)

Jude went off and then came Cracker. There is something about seeing a show when you haven't seen them for a while and they haven't played for a while that makes it extra cool. The energy seemed really great. Their rendition of 100 Flower Power Maximum seemed especially intense... Um... David practically got all the lyrics of Dr. Bernice to fit in the right places. ;-) There were a few drunk (I hope, I mean either they were drunk or just really rude and stupid...) guys behind and to the right of me that kept yelling out requests, mostly "I got me a dog!!!!!!!" and "I'm so fucking sick!!!!!!!!!!!!" and on one of the occasions Johnny said it was weird cause he was just thinking that and so Cracker promptly broke out into Useless Stuff. =) Comments have already been made on the Wilco show comment from David, so I'll just leave that out... um... They were fairly talkative. I believe at one point David did say "We're drunk and we haven't played in a while..." oh, for you string counters... David broke 3 strings, one in Pictures of Matchstick Men and 2 (count 'em) 2 in Low.

I think me the high point of the night was the break after the false start of Low. where David told his Courtney Cox story. That was pretty funny I think...Gets me to thinking whether or not I should start saving up money for when I get married though... =) Um... and also when David started taking requests. Despite me being in the front row, directly in front of David, I couldn't even hear MYSELF when I was desperately yelling out "The Pagan Birth of Jesus"... Maybe I'll try "China" next time, since it's shorter. =) I loved the way David teased the crowd with Low. ("And don't say Low," cause you know we're going to play it" or something like that he said... "Unless you don't want us to play it, cause we don't have to...") I think the dream Cracker concert would be a non Low concert... maybe a b-sides and mp3 releases concert rather than an "MTV concert" ;-) I suppose that might take the crowd out of it a little though...

Anyway it was a great show, the best of the 3 this weekend, experience wise, I believe... =) Afterwards, we got to sit and chat with Johnny for a while and he told some great stories. =) Did you realize there were a ton of other verses to Mr. Wrong and David just picked out the ones he thought were the best? Um... And Johnny's working on a "sequel" to Mr. Wrong" now... Oh and you Southern Californians... you ought to get out to frequent those Kareoke bars... you just might catch a Hickman Clan concert... =) apparently Johnny's training his nephews to be little Johnny's w/ the backing vocals thing... um... I'll stop here cause there's no way I can remember all that was said that night. It was really cool though. Oh and we got a picture w/ Johnny too. =)

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I can't add much that hasn't been said before, but I do agree that this was the best show of the three this past weekend. The guys in Cracker hadn't played in quite a while - and they all seemed really excited to be back on stage.

The stage was really tiny - David and Johnny bumped into each other a few times - and Kenny kept hitting the rafters while playing the accordion. Frank almost tripped crawling into his drum set even ..

I especially loved David's comments all through out the show .. "quit requesting Low - of course we are going to play that one - do you think we're stupid?" "Don't just say 'play Camper' you have to request a song - and the album it's from" (or fairly close to that).

David's Courtney Cox story was great - especially with Sweet Home Alabama topping it off. : )

Fletcher's must have a set time for ending shows or something because David said that they werent going to have an encore - they would just keep on playing till they had to stop.

After the show was especially great - everyone came out to talk to the fans that were sticking around. I saw Nancy and Tony (among others) having a good time talking to David. Johnny came out on stage and sat with a little group of us telling us all about extra verses to songs and inspirations to songs. Mr Wrong was written about his brother, but the title came to him another time ... he walked into a bar covered in mud after a misadventure involving a friend, a jeep, alcohol, and lots of mud - and this girl in the nearly empty bar says "I've been waiting all night for Mr Right to walk through that door - and who comes in? Mr. Wrong".

We hung around so long that the Fletcher's people kicked us out, and we ended up out on the sidewalk with Johnny playing Happy Birthday to Me for Mark Cathell - very classic.

Jude was the opener and I was quite happy to find out that all their songs don't sound like that Rick James song on the radio.

Oh, just before we left I got to take a picture of Jill with Jude and the splendor of Baltimore. : ) The garbage men were out collecting things ... and that served as the back drop for the picture I took of those two.

After all that ... we race southwards - we made it all the way down to Virginia Beach just after sunrise. We didnt look all that pretty but we made it to a great place to stay (and start the next day's adventures ....) (thanks ~Chris~ !)

John

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jude was amazing, he was so great. and that little setlist incident made it all the better. :) of course, in between cracker and jude's set, jessica informed me that while jude was talking about the whole setlist thing that i did onstage, david was watching from the side and just laughing. so i felt like an idiot after that. :) it was still great though. jude was so great. if anyone knows his stuff, he played....you mama you, indian lover, i'm sorry now, rick james, out of la, brad and suzy, i do (for me!!), and prophet.

cracker came on and were great from the start. we were all wrong in our predictions for opening song, most of us going with been aorund the world, they opened with dr bernice (as others have said). 100 flower power maximum was the best, most intense version of it that i had heard them do. i was talking to kenny afterwards about how energized the whole show seemed, and he said that's because it was people like us in the front rows. which was probably true. we did pretty much cover the front row, and the next couple as well.

i was very surprised, as everyone else was, that they were taking requests. johnny looked right at me a couple times as they were doing that, and i tried saying "sweethearts", but i cannot yell loudly at all, so i'm sure he didnt hear me, despite how close i was..just like jess' request; was a good though, but the sound didnt go past our own mouths. :)

it was neat how all the guys (except for bob) came out after the show.. i was one of the couple of us talking with johnny, and all of a sudden frank came up to us and looked at me and was like "you're the one we snuck into the halloween show!"....meaning the show this past year at the floodzone, 18 and up, when i was 17. kenny was very cool too. i actually felt kind of bad, because jude was in the middle of signing my cds and kenny came up to me and was like "how have you been?", but by then some groupie came up to jude so i didnt feel so bad about cutting him off (though at that point jude and i had already chatted for a bit, so it's all good)

john, i told kenny how you tried charging me double for my fletchers ticket since i love jude and cracker so much. so dont think i've forgotten how you tried that little number on me. :) got a picture of mark cathell and me with kenny (mark, i have a copy for you, it turned out well).

johnny's little rendition of happy bday to me outside the club with his new harmonica and mark cathell was pretty cool. did i mention how mark had a little trouble remembering one line fromt he song? no. i'll keep it that way.
:)

i have to mention this, because i know chris will "forget" to when she posts next. :) well chris was driving as we were getting close to fletchers, and we were on this road (imagine that :)), well the light was red...i was sure chris noticed it and was gonna stop, but she kept going slowly, so finally she crossed the middle of the street and we were all trying to tell her about the red light! she saw it, but it was too late. did i mention that the intersection she illegally crossed was right where a police station was with two police cars sitting out front??? luckily for chris, there was an off-duty cop standing there, but no one in uniform. we all needed a little excitement before the show, so from john, jess, and me, THANK YOU CHRIS! :)

that is all from me for the fletchers show. oh and i can vouch for jessica, the bathrooms at fletchers were indeed cool. :)

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