It's interesting to take in all the impressions so far - I'm hitting up the Wallingford show Sunday night and at this point, I literally have no idea what to expect.
I mean, I'm pretty sure they'll prob. open with Big Empty, like usual, and stick to pretty much that core of songs that have made the cut every show so far - but I'm hoping, fingers crossed, maybe this will be the first show where they do some rotating of other stuff in there. But even if not, I appreciate that they're working deep cuts like Sin, Silvergun Superman, Too Cool Queenie, Lady Picture Show and Loungefly into the mix.
I'd like to see more diversity in the acoustic set - instead of just Sour Girl and Creep every time, both of which I've heard about 100 times live. But that might be coming later down the road. Some more songs off No. 4 and Shangri La would be great too. I do love Coma however, so I hope they don't drop that.
From comments I'm seeing, and the mp3 downloads I heard from the Columbus show (and that was when they were supposed to have been 'rusty') - I think musically they have their stuff pretty together, with the exception of a few minor flaws here and there. Eric, as mentioned, has been rock-solid, which is important. If the drummer is off, your timing and overall sound is fucked - no matter how otherworldly your other guys are. So that's good right there. Robert and Dean always bring it - the brother connection is the best chemistry thing between them - you can feel it at their live shows. Hopefully Dean won't blow any more amps.
Finally, as we all know, Scott's the wild card. The dude has just been through (and is probably still going through) so much - and we really have no idea exactly what it is, or how it's impacting him - that it could literally be affecting his performance in about at least a dozen different ways. Hope he continues to sound good (and remember the words for the most part).
I can't get my head around what an STP live show might look like without him gyrating around like a maniac who's just sniffed a mountain of coke or something - but I have a feeling that's what I'm going to see.
I'm sure it'll rock either way.
