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Greg Laswell at the Cedar
Setlist
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Greg Laswell, now with a full band, played the Cedar Cultural Center, in Minneapolis, on Thursday, September 26th.
There was no opening band, so the seated show started early (and ended early), due to the all-ages status of the Cedar’s show policy.
I first saw Laswell, playing solo with Harper Blynn helping with his live set, in November 2010 at the Turf Club. The one memory I had of the performance was that Laswell had covered “Girls Just Want to Have Fun”, but making it really upsettingly sad. That’s because the original Robert Hazard version was from a boy’s perspective of how girls just want to have fun. Of course, Cyndi Lauper’s cover is what people think of when they think of that song.
His cover songs, from his original Covers album, proved to be a hit, so the Los Angeles singer decided to revisit the record and record an all-new Covers II album. This time, he would tackle Catherine Wheel, PJ Harvey, Psychedelic Furs, Placebo, etc… plus duets with Molly Jenson on Röyksopp, Depeche Mode , Peter Gabriel, and The Verve covers. You can tell that his influences are in UK bands, based on the choice of bands and artists he decided to cover.
If you were expecting an all-covers set, you may be in for a disappointment, as given the 15 plus years of writing songs, Laswell played quite a few songs from his music catalog. And even if you heard the cover songs, if you know how Laswell approaches his cover songs, they sound completely different than the original songs.
For example, his double-cover whammy of Kristin Hersh’s “Your Ghost” and PJ Harvey’s “A Place Called Home”, sounded very slow and, if you didn’t know they were covers, you would they were just standard Laswell songs.
“Royal Empress” was actually played twice in the set. The first version is closer to the studio version, while the second song is with a full live band. Greg Laswell explained that this only happened a few shows ago when they had sound difficulties at a venue… so he decided to just start playing the song solo (while they worked out the kinks). Once the sound problems were fixed, they started the song again with the rest of the band. They liked how that worked out, that they decided to permanently add that to their set.
Perhaps the most personal song on the playlist was “Super Moon”, which is about Laswell’s father who had passed away to Alzheimer's Disease. As he was explaining how his father was like a “super moon” (how you just had to be there), he choked up with tears coming out. He paused and recomposed and joked that he doesn’t cry when he sings the song.
Remaining tour dates:
There was no opening band, so the seated show started early (and ended early), due to the all-ages status of the Cedar’s show policy.
I first saw Laswell, playing solo with Harper Blynn helping with his live set, in November 2010 at the Turf Club. The one memory I had of the performance was that Laswell had covered “Girls Just Want to Have Fun”, but making it really upsettingly sad. That’s because the original Robert Hazard version was from a boy’s perspective of how girls just want to have fun. Of course, Cyndi Lauper’s cover is what people think of when they think of that song.
His cover songs, from his original Covers album, proved to be a hit, so the Los Angeles singer decided to revisit the record and record an all-new Covers II album. This time, he would tackle Catherine Wheel, PJ Harvey, Psychedelic Furs, Placebo, etc… plus duets with Molly Jenson on Röyksopp, Depeche Mode , Peter Gabriel, and The Verve covers. You can tell that his influences are in UK bands, based on the choice of bands and artists he decided to cover.
If you were expecting an all-covers set, you may be in for a disappointment, as given the 15 plus years of writing songs, Laswell played quite a few songs from his music catalog. And even if you heard the cover songs, if you know how Laswell approaches his cover songs, they sound completely different than the original songs.
For example, his double-cover whammy of Kristin Hersh’s “Your Ghost” and PJ Harvey’s “A Place Called Home”, sounded very slow and, if you didn’t know they were covers, you would they were just standard Laswell songs.
“Royal Empress” was actually played twice in the set. The first version is closer to the studio version, while the second song is with a full live band. Greg Laswell explained that this only happened a few shows ago when they had sound difficulties at a venue… so he decided to just start playing the song solo (while they worked out the kinks). Once the sound problems were fixed, they started the song again with the rest of the band. They liked how that worked out, that they decided to permanently add that to their set.
Perhaps the most personal song on the playlist was “Super Moon”, which is about Laswell’s father who had passed away to Alzheimer's Disease. As he was explaining how his father was like a “super moon” (how you just had to be there), he choked up with tears coming out. He paused and recomposed and joked that he doesn’t cry when he sings the song.
Remaining tour dates:
09/19/2019 State Room
Salt Lake City, UT
09/26/2019 Cedar Cultural Center Minneapolis, MN
09/28/2019 The Ark Ann Arbor, MI
09/30/2019 Rams Head On Stage Annapolis, MD
10/03/2019 City Winery Boston Boston, MA
10/04/2019 Infinity Hall Norfolk Norfolk, CT
10/06/2019 City Winery Washington, DC
09/26/2019 Cedar Cultural Center Minneapolis, MN
09/28/2019 The Ark Ann Arbor, MI
09/30/2019 Rams Head On Stage Annapolis, MD
10/03/2019 City Winery Boston Boston, MA
10/04/2019 Infinity Hall Norfolk Norfolk, CT
10/06/2019 City Winery Washington, DC
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Greg Laswell at Cedar Cultural Center, Minneapolis (26 Sep 2019) |
