Setlist: (close to the actual order)

The Moth, Red Vines, Choice in the Matter, Amateur, Humpty Dumpty, Lost in Space, Wise Up, Save Me, That's Just What You Are, Pavlov's Bell, I Should've Known, Longshot

E: ??, ??, Calling it Quits, I've Had It, Voices Carry, Deathly, Stupid Thing, It's Not

A much older crowd than expected - I'm 33, and most of the folks were 40 or so. Reminiscing about their youth, perhaps? Very sedate, either way. The crowd only stood to use the bathroom, get drinks, or applaud for the encores. To be fair, though, most of Aimee's music doesn't necessarily lend itself to dancing.

The mood started mellow - new song, "The Moth." Bouncy - she did a mix of songs from her more recent solo albums for about 1/2, and featured some great new tunes - "Lost In Space" was particularly trippy; keyboards were very loopy -- but all very straight-forward interpretations. Almost exactly like the recordings. Minor note: it was hard to hear Aimee's guitar, except when she switched to bass. All the other instruments were well miked, and well balanced.

Around the middle, she dipped into songs from Magnolia soundtrack. Both were received very well from the audience, and the band started to loosen up. "Save Me" - which most of the crowd sang along with - had some cool keyboard effects, making it very ethereal, very freaky (fitting the lyrics, perhaps.) And from here until the end, the band started to rock - some improvisations at the end; solos that differed from the recordings. They were having lots of fun with "Pavlov's Bell" - from the new album - as well as "I Should've Known" and "Longshot". "Long Shot" was a highlight - very catchy; lots of raucous guitar and improv work. Aimee and her fellow guitarists even danced together as they took turns soloing. Unfortunately, that was the end.

But Aimee and the band came out for 4 encores/8 songs - a mixture of hidden gems and crowd favorites - all reworked more and more as the night went on. She even gave in and provided an improvised "Voices Carry", with a drastically different arrangement, much to the delight of the older crowd, who seemed to have been clamoring for Til' Tuesday material. "I've Had It" was really well played, with good percussion work and keyboarding.

She finished with "It's Not" - also from "Lost In Space" - not a typical choice for the very last song. She even joked that Michael Lockwood (lead guitarist) regards this as her most depressing song ever, and that it was her job to make sure people left the show depressed. However, it seemed to be an ironic commentary of the show as a whole - the repeated lyric "People are tricky; you can't afford to show . . . anything different; anything they don't know" underscored my take on the concert. Many of the fans were reluctant to follow Aimee into newer material, and probably would have been satisfied by only the songs they loved, played exactly as they knew them.

Still, the band did get to have fun; Aimee even quipped that the audience may have only come to see her because they couldn't get Springsteen tickets. She even took a stab at "Born To Run" - only to give up after improvising the lyrics . . . "That's it - something about a velvet room . . ." and returning to her own material. And my friends and I also enjoyed the show - though mostly the latter half - because the synergy between band and audience finally kicked in.

-Guy Harris (G-Phatty)