Rob Thomas didn't even need that hit with Santana to be “Smooth” Tuesday night at Star Lake, but it was Adam Duritz who proved to be the more compelling frontman in the pairing of ’90s sort-of-alt-rock hitmakers.
Of course, the venue is actually called the KeyBank Pavilion, but Thomas preferred to call it Star Lake, because that’s how he remembers it (like many Pittsburghers), that’s what came up on his weather app, and, he said, “No one wants to say ‘I had the greatest time of my life and I puked and someone drove me home … from KeyBank.’ ”
When @RobThomas calls Key Bank Pav "Star Lake" you know it's the 90s tonight #matchbox20
— rach (@rachhmart) September 13, 2017
Having the greatest time of your life would have been a challenge anyway because it was very much a Tuesday school/work night in mid-September — it felt weird even being out there -- and even big fans of Matchbox Twenty and Counting Crows will concede that they are not the most thrilling bands in the world.
Counting Crows got it off to an interesting start, wandering onto the stage in the 7:30 twilight doing “Omaha” with the house lights up, no stage lighting whatsoever and Duritz standing there with his hand shoved in his jeans pocket. “I wanted to see what would happen if we just came on without putting the lights down,” Duritz would explain. It looked like Warped Tour in the afternoon. “I don't know. I'm glad it's dark again,” he said. The band from Berkeley, Calif., actually had some creative lighting behind it, so we were glad, too.
.@CountingCrows are always awesome live!#abriefhistorytour pic.twitter.com/NEwkZhK0LL
— Jordan Hinds (@jordan_hinds) September 13, 2017
Duritz has always been a character, and seems even more so now, looking like he was in disguise with the wild, dreadlocked wig, dark beard, glasses and Marvel Iron Fist T-shirt (thanks for the info, Twitter).
There’s that line in “Mr. Jones” where he sings “I wanna be Bob Dylan,” and while he’ll never rise to that echelon (like every other songwriter in the world), he does have a unique lyrical gift and he loves to mess with the phrasing of the songs, giving them extra live energy and maybe mildly frustrating fans who want the melodies just the way they were recorded. “Mr. Jones,” which they unwisely dropped from their setlist on a recent trip to Stage AE, was a perfect example of that.
When you watch Duritz on stage, doing songs like “Dislocation,” “Colorblind” and “A Long December,” it seems less like he’s performing the songs and more like he’s reliving them. The crowd, though chatty at times (as always with Counting Crows — it’s a thing), seems to feel that same closeness to his confessional lyricism and you could see the joy in the faces of people relating to them.
With the dual guitars of David Bryson and Dan Vickrey, and David Immerglück and Charlie Gillingham stepping forward with mandolin and accordion, Counting Crows had a good mix of tender songs like “Blues Run The Game” and clattering rockers like “Miami,” “Hanginaround” and the finale of “Rain King.” The cover of “Big Yellow Taxi,” a Joni Mitchell song that Dylan once toyed with, was equally well received and another chance for Duritz to tweak the rhythm.
Hey @CountingCrows how yinz gonna come to Pittsburgh and not play Round Here? pic.twitter.com/arrXdKyuba
— Matt Brewer (@tmatthew_brewer) September 13, 2017
I’ll just tell you up front that I’ve never been a big Matchbox Twenty fan, and Tuesday night didn’t change that much. Between Thomas and lead guitarist Kyle Cook, the talent is certainly there, but the radio-friendly, hard-luck love songs have never been terribly interesting or imaginative.
They came on strong with one of the better ones, “Real World” — from when they were Matchbox 20 — and kept the momentum going through “Girl Like That” and the recent entry “She's So Mean.” Within a few songs, it seemed like we’d heard much of what MB20 had to offer and a general feeling of ordinariness began to settle in.
The tempos, though, did shift, from “the couples skate” of “If You're Gone” and “Hand Me Down” to the more frantic “So Sad So Lonely,” and the affable Thomas didn’t skimp on the passion, especially on “English Town.” There was no shortage of MB20 crowd-pleasing hits to roll toward a finish with “Unwell,” “Back 2 Good,” “Push,” “3 A.M.” and “Bright Lights.”
Explaining how they were going to try to make it feel like a weekend, Thomas said at one point, “Here’s the thing. We already got your money, you got babysitters for this, you got in line for tickets… By the time we get this done, we’re gonna feel like we celebrated life at Star Lake tonight.”
It’s safe to say that fans who came to hear those favorite songs from the late ’90s/early ’00s got what they wanted from Thomas, Duritz and company.
I can't believe I got stuck in Matchbox 20 traffic in 2017.
— Randy Slack (@Slackamania) September 12, 2017
Scott Mervis: smervis@post-gazette.com; Twitter: @scottmervis_pg
Matchbox Twenty Setlist
Real World
Girl Like That
She's So Mean
Bent
Downfall (with Knockin' On Heaven's Door)
If You're Gone
Hand Me Down
How Far We've Come
Disease
Mad Season
So Sad So Lonely
English Town
Hang
Unwell
Back 2 Good
Push
Encore:
3 A.M.
Long Day
Bright Lights
Counting Crows Setlist
Omaha
Hard Candy
Dislocation
Colorblind
I Wish I Was a Girl
Miami
Speedway
Blues Run The Game
Big Yellow Taxi
A Long December
Elvis Went to Hollywood
Mr. Jones
Hanginaround
Encore:
Palisades Park
Rain King
First Published: September 13, 2017, 2:24 p.m.
Updated: September 13, 2017, 2:29 p.m.