BECK: LEVEL 5 BODY THETAN IN THE CHURCH OF SERIOUS OWNOLOGY

Jeet Christ he ripped it up last night.

Alright, fine. I do have a few complaints. I was a bit disappointed in his 80 minute set (although this is standard, it was just an expensive show). Some of the songs were sped up and a few were neutered. The crowd itself was mostly dead; they didn't seem to know much pre-Guero save for the mega-hits like "Where It's At" and "Loser", so when Beck tore out "Minus" in the beginning of his set many seemed confused. The venue (United Palace Theater, which doubles as a church, which has a sign out in front of it that says "Come on in or smile as you walk by") was assigned seating, which became assigned standing when Beck came on.

Now here are the good things about the show:

• Beck is cool as hell.
• Huge setlist.
• Tight band with tons of energy even though the drummer was clearly taking cues from the keyboardist.
• Awesome stage lights - the screen behind him lit up with patterns and at first you think they're just for simple shapes and whatever, but then full images start taking shape and moving behind the band.
• Beck is fuckin' cool.
• The sound was great save for some odd screw ups with "Hell Yes".
• The new song they played during the encore was so damn hardcore.
• They played "Walls", which is rare.
  
• The cute black-haired guitarist was shredding it up like what.
• Beck is one cool mother fucker.

He is a very mellow person in general, but was clearly tired, which is to be expected. This is a three-night show, but it was originally only one night (the night I went to). My friend managed to get the tickets the moment they went on sale so we were rockin' the orchestra seating (fantastic seats, too).

MGMT opened, and while they were much tighter than the last time I watched them live, the second half of their set was pretty boring. They used up all of their ammunition in the first half (playing "Electric Feel" and "Time to Pretend" back-to-back) and the second half kinda dragged on. The show would have felt complete even if they weren't there.

I'll post a few of my pictures, but my camera absolutely sucks for concerts.







Better pictures, full setlist, and a video of his performance on Letterman is here.