So, we took Greyhound up to Columbus to see OTR open for Ani DiFranco on Wednesday, an adventure fraught with serendipity and divine intervention (including a meetup with an online friend who just happened to get stood up and had an extra ticket, so our girlfriend Kitminx was able to see the show with us, providing us the opportunity to make good on an oft-promised dance for Juicy since we spent the concert back by the sound board).
It was a short opening set, only 7 songs ('Yote got the set list, but I don't have it handy at the moment). The crowd appeared to seriously appreciate "If A Song Could Be President", but then Ani crowds tend to be into causes, and we DID just have a primary in Ohio.
They opened with "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child", and closed with "Orphan Girl", and of *course* they played "Trouble" (thus the aforementioned opportunity...see Kitminx did some choreography several months ago...and...um...well, you've just got to see it). *ahem*I have to admit, as wonderful as they are as a trio (and I'd seen them perform that way before at the Rivertown Breakdown in June...the only show I ever saw without my beloved 'Yote), it was *weird* not to have Mickey there. I kept hearing where the drums should have been, and I missed his harmonies on "I'm on a Roll". There's just an energy level they don't quite hit without the drums along. But it still came off beautifully, and the crowd seemed to really enjoy it.
Another oddity was seeing Linford man the merch table himself. My first thought was "Why didn't they put out a call to help with merch?"...and then suddenly realized that this wasn't a full-fledged OTR show and they were the "junior partners" here...which rather twisted my reality for a minute. Saw some guy giving "the kid" pointers on what he could do to sell more CD's. Linford, to his credit, was totally gracious. 'Yote and I just snickered.
Funny story on the way into the venue - we were stopped by someone having people fill out entries for a giveaway, and as we were filling out the forms, she asked "So are you big Ani fans?", and we chuckled and said, "Well, actually, we're mostly here to see the opener." Then she asked us where we were from, and when we told her Cincinnati, she looked all perplexed and said "Someone else just told me the very same thing!" *chuckle* So, though we didn't spot any, we know there were other Apples in attendance somewhere.
I should probably make a comment or two about Ani, since she *was* the headliner.
I've only had limited exposure to her actual music (heard a lot *about* her over the years, but had never really *heard* her before). Same thing, honestly, for Kitminx. 'Yote had seen her in concert before (I think opening for Bob Dylan, but he can correct me on that...considering all the writing he's done about Dylan lately, I'm allowed to get that mixed up), and has promised to dig out his disks...because Kitminx and I were both favorably impressed. Ani is a HOOT live, she kept me laughing. And some of the music just floored me. So yeah, all in all it was definitely worth all the dice-rolling mental rubics cube manipulation involved in getting us up there (and then getting home...we were *supposed* to be back in Cincinnati Saturday afternoon...the weather gods apparently had other plans). Considering it made an even 20 shows in a year for me (the anniversary of my first ever OTR show is the 16th, and they won't be playing near enough for me to rack up any more before then at this point), I'm really really glad we went.
So how about you? Who else has made it to one of the Ani concerts? What did y'all think?
