Todd-Wilshire Theatre LA 05-17-05

This show was gay. We arrived in the gay part of town (the westside) only to be shuttled into a gay parking arrangement which took us into a phantom non-parking area and back out to LaCienega Blvd. Outside there were gay people and gay winos milling about. The gay security couldn't wait to pat us down with their svelt gay hands. The choice of beer was gay, only Rolling Rock and Pacifico? gay. The restroom lines were a forray into gayness previously unseen. The setlist was gay, but not as gay as Joe's diamond earrings. But what wasn't gay was the set change between Ethyl and Joe Jackson. The house lights didn't even come on, they pushed Ethyl's riser offstage, pushed Joe's piano forward, and in less than five minutes Joe comes out to do his first number.

But seriously folks......

Todd in L.A.

He was up for this one, and performed well, despite a few of the aforementioned playing mistakes.

I liked this show better than the solo House of Pose shows a few years back, but will also reitterate that the Todd & Liars tour last time was one of the best. This was not. This show was somewhere in the middle of the many Todd solo performances I've seen. Not the worst, but not the best either.

Joe was excellent. I'm not a big Joe fan, but he is a really good piano player. In general, I find some of his material boring, but was very entertained by his set last night. The Joe fans are an odd bunch though. I talked to someone who had seen Joe 14 times, but had never seen Todd. O-kaaay. There has been some discussion about Todd playing it safe with the set list. This is probably to please the Joe fans. They want hits, but the Joe fans could not be pleased by even the most mundane of Todd songs, leaving diehard Todd fans going what the F???. So, setlist-wise no one is happy. Todd should just damn the torpedos and play whatever he feels like. Highlights of this shoew are obvious - "I Don't Want To Tie You Down", Compassion, Tiny Demons, & While My Guitar Gently Weeps. That's it for anything remotely stellar. I'll leave the rest open for discussion.

Personally, I do not think Todds' performance warranted some of the criticism's I've read on here, sans song selection. The show was good, the show was different, and a lot of fun.