"and this is mike on the guitar"

shadow, loaded, flight to mars
showbox, seattle. may 2

every year i've lived in washington, i've gone to the CCFA benefit show mike mccready, et. al put on at the showbox. and every year i've had a great time, but i gotta say that this year was probably the best. seriously, i have always believed that pearl jam is greater than the sum of its parts, but in the absence of them, i sure as hell am enjoying all their side projects (i swear that PJ's guitar tech - who was working on the show - had a shirt on that said "ev tour crew." i can't wait until june!!)

just like he did in august and december, mike came out first to do a couple acoustic songs. then chris and rick came on stage and they did their jimi hendrix stuff (which is great - LOUD, but *great*). as a pearl jam fan, you might never know that there's this whole other side to mike, one that he probably doesn't often get the chance to express in the confines of PJ (not that that's a bad thing, it just is what it is). also, i love when he sings. the other thing i love is when he points to people in the audience when he plays. makes it seem more intimate, somehow. towards the end of shadow's set, mike said that they were going to bring out a special guest... stone gossard! cool. 2/5 of pearl jam makes me a happy girl.

honestly, i don't remember what stone sang ;) it was good, though. then he left. (wow, this is an insightful review, huh?)

i wasn't really expecting to like duff mckagen's band, loaded. but i was pleasantly surprised. quite pleasantly. i really really thought they were great.

they ended with a cover of i wanna be your dog that absolutely floored me. in fact, flight to mars also did that song later, and i must say that i preferred loaded's version.

flight to mars came on around 11:30.

as we were driving home, i told my friend kristine that it seems like it's not often we get to see old-fashioned rock-n-roll like that. during the encore, they brought out this guy named jeremy who had the highest bid on an online auction (to benefit CCFA) and got the chance to play guitar on stage with flight to mars.