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Bird and Bee Setlist
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Los Angeles' The Bird and the Bee recently came through town on a tiny tour in support of their latest Recreational Love, available now on Rostrum Records. The Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis was only one of four dates on this modest tour, mostly thanks to "Infamous Jenny" for inspiring one of their latest song ("Jenny") on Recreational Love. Jenny was in the audience last night, but unfortunately, due to music arrangements/setup, they were unable to play that song on their set on Monday night.
After doors opened, DJ Jake Rudh played a few cuts from the 60s and 70s. They did use the video projection for some music videos, but it was barely used between Alex Lilly's set and The Bird and the Bee (which had a shorter setup time).
Alex Lilly opened up the show with her two helper-singers (Samantha Sidley and Inga Roberts) and Wendy Wang on guitar. They were mostly all wearing a purple sparkly dress ... and you find out later that Lilly, Sidley and Wang are also all in The Bird and the Bee's live band.
Although Lilly had her three old previous albums for sale at the merch table, she actually only played brand new (and unreleased) songs. All the songs, with working titles, are presumably from a forthcoming album, with the exception of only "Paranoid Times" released as the lead single.
We are assuming once the new album comes out (next year?), there may be a promotional tour behind it.
As for The Bird and the Bee, we knew going in that Greg Kurstin would not be joining the band on tour. According to singer Inara George (daughter of the late Lowell George of Little Feat), after a back-to-back full national tour in 2008 and 2009, Kurstin decided the touring life was not for him. It's understandable, you basically have to put your work and life on hold... and it's a similar story we've heard before with Nick Littlemore refusing to tour with Luke Steele for Empire of the Sun.
Fortunately, The Bird and the Bee can still function without Kurstin for the live show (it's not true the other way around, since you cannot substitute Inara's wonderful 60s-sounding vocals) with Alex Lilly doing a wonderful job on keys.
Although their set is the same for this tour, Inara actually did not know what songs they were going to play after "Will You Dance?" and had soundboard Chris running to the back to bring their set list to the stage. Regarding forgetting song titles and order, Inara would later confessed that she even had trouble remembering her own lyrics to her songs.
Like many touring bands, they said that they put Prince (+1) on the guestlist and hoped fans reached out to the singer. We're pretty sure he didn't show up.
They covered two Hall & Oates songs on their set, back to back. The first, "Sara Smile", which they dedicated to a fan in the audience (also named Sara). Embarrassingly enough, she was running late and did not catch the dedication.
For "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)", they intentionally left off "No Can Do" lyrics (so that the audience can sing back). Maybe the audience didn't know the song, but I only heard one or two people singing back the "whooa-no-can-do" response.
After taking a photo and video of the crowd for Greg Kurstin, Inara was still determined to have his involvement in the band. For the encore, "I'm a Broken Heart" medley with Cameron Mitchell's "How Deep Is Your Love", Inara is by herself, holding up a video of Kurstin playing piano on her oversized phone. While this is a nice gesture, personally speaking, I didn't think they needed this. I would have preferred to have Lilly play the piano/keys part... but then again, maybe after a double duty on this tour, she just wanted the break.
With the band's long absent in Minneapolis (their last appearance was at the Varsity Theater in 2008), it was just wonderful to have the band back in the city - with or without Kurstin.
The Bird and the Bee's final Recreational Love tour stop will be taking place at the Irenic in San Diego, California on November 29th.
After doors opened, DJ Jake Rudh played a few cuts from the 60s and 70s. They did use the video projection for some music videos, but it was barely used between Alex Lilly's set and The Bird and the Bee (which had a shorter setup time).
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Alex Lilly with band
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Alex Lilly
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As for The Bird and the Bee, we knew going in that Greg Kurstin would not be joining the band on tour. According to singer Inara George (daughter of the late Lowell George of Little Feat), after a back-to-back full national tour in 2008 and 2009, Kurstin decided the touring life was not for him. It's understandable, you basically have to put your work and life on hold... and it's a similar story we've heard before with Nick Littlemore refusing to tour with Luke Steele for Empire of the Sun.
Fortunately, The Bird and the Bee can still function without Kurstin for the live show (it's not true the other way around, since you cannot substitute Inara's wonderful 60s-sounding vocals) with Alex Lilly doing a wonderful job on keys.
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Setlist
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Like many touring bands, they said that they put Prince (+1) on the guestlist and hoped fans reached out to the singer. We're pretty sure he didn't show up.
They covered two Hall & Oates songs on their set, back to back. The first, "Sara Smile", which they dedicated to a fan in the audience (also named Sara). Embarrassingly enough, she was running late and did not catch the dedication.
For "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)", they intentionally left off "No Can Do" lyrics (so that the audience can sing back). Maybe the audience didn't know the song, but I only heard one or two people singing back the "whooa-no-can-do" response.
Greg Kurstin's appearance
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With the band's long absent in Minneapolis (their last appearance was at the Varsity Theater in 2008), it was just wonderful to have the band back in the city - with or without Kurstin.
The Bird and the Bee's final Recreational Love tour stop will be taking place at the Irenic in San Diego, California on November 29th.
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The Bird and the Bee at Cedar Cultural Center, Minneapolis (02 Nov 2015) |
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