House of Blues 2000 question...

[seattlesound]

It's been touched on a time or two over the years... but I want to put it all together here and get some feedback...

Why were a lot of the songs played at a slower tempo?

Was it just the band doing things a little different keeping it interesting? If the whole show was played that way the obvious answer would be to help Scott if he had been having a bad day, but that doesn't seem be the case as Scott is simply laying down some of his best work as the whole band did too.

Just curious, each time I see the show or songs from it I wonder if there was any need that caused the band to play many songs at the slower speed.

[Hr308]

I can see two reasons, this is just me thinking

1) to get more breath , because it sometimes is hard to sing constantly at a faster temp

2) to lengthen the set slightly

[NickLorenza]

I am not sure why, because the band is in their pinnacle here. Compare the speed of the songs here with Rolling Rock. Rolling Rock they are also at their peak but the songs are played much faster.


What I can tell you is that it is of my opinion/belief that they play an abbreviated Piece Of Pie live in order to ensure that Scott doesn't blow out his voice. Imagine having to sing those songs 3-5 nights a week. There is no way that even Scott could have done a full unabbreviated version of Piece Of Pie that many times a week without damaging his voice.


Also Paul isn't wrong necessarily, it just depends on the song.  Trippin On A Hole In A Paper Heart feels weird to sing slow.  That song needs to have a certain flow to it to feel comfortable singing it. Whereas Lady Picture Show only feels right slow. I personally like Interstate Love Song to be a little slow too when Im singing.  As for Sex Type Thing I only feel comfortable singing it at the Spring Break '97 hot rodded pace.  Those are all just personal preferences though. Different people will feel more comfortable at different paces.

[Blue]

I think at this point they were experimenting with a slower tempo to "put more space between the notes." You'll notice they continued playing songs at a slower tempo during the SLDD tour, just not to quite the same extent. Even with Chester they were playing slower.


I think they just like the way it sounds... But maybe with this show they went a little too far.