The Suzanne Vega concert last night was wonderful. I am re-enjoying it this morning, with flashbacks of musical moments.
It started out not too well, when it transpired that the venue's website and Suzanne's website had both been selling tickets .... the same tickets... and quite a few seats were double booked. There were little knots of people comparing tickets and wondering how it was possible that yes, they BOTH had genuine tickets for the same seat, and yes, it was today's date, and yes, they HAD got the row correct... The staff started out confident, then retreated to "all I can do is apologise", and eventually took to hiding. However, it all seemed to get resolved in the end, and our seats were not in debate. It gave us all something to talk about, anyway.
The support act turned out to be Gary Daly, one of the two main people from China Crisis. China Crisis? "Black Man Ray"? No?
And his friend (or possibly daughter?) Megan. They were quite good, too. Better than most of Suzanne's support acts. (I didn't like Nerina Pallot who supported her before, nor that over the top Christian guy).
Suzanne's set was excellent, and I particularly enjoyed (as before) the session with just her and bassist Mike Visceglia (Small Blue Thing, Left of Center, and Blood Makes Noise as I remember it).
And the instrumental version of Tom's Diner was excellent, much better than the "everybody join in clapping hands" attempt that she used to do. There wasn't a dud one in the whole set, really. I've not been that keen on her latest album, but she definitely sold me on one or two of the tracks last night, and she also did lots of old favourites.
Of course, us VIPs got to hang out briefly with Suzanne afterwards and take photos, while the lesser fans queued outside the stage door in the rain hoping for a glimpse.... what? Me shallow? Yes, but I find there is something about being "up close" to someone, in their physical presence, seeing what they're like after their stage persona drops (a little bit).
