“One Big Holiday” for My Morning Jacket & The Signature Library

1 week, 6 nights, 5 shows, 5 albums, 100 songs, and only 1 repeat. From The Tennessee Fire to Evil Urges, and from Heavy Metal (Black Sabbath) to Country (Bobby Bare) there was nothing My Morning Jacket didn’t and couldn’t tackle this week. Whether you were a die hard MMJ follower or have never seen them before, this weeks run of shows had something for everybody. It is this unbelievable range of music genres and musicianship that in my opinion sets My Morning Jacket apart from any contemporary live act. The bands 5 piece was accompanied throughout the week by a horn section (Elvis Perkins in Dearland) that made cover songs like Sly & The Family Stone’s Hot Fun In The Summertime sound just the way Sly intended it to sound. It’s not just the ease and perfection of the music that MMJ performs each night, but also their genuine appreciation for their musical predecessors and influencers that make them so unique in this day and age where most music history is lost. MMJ’s selection of cover songs for each nights encore was something I may never see again from one band. It didn’t matter how soft (George Michael’s Careless Whisper) or how hard (Danzig’s How The Gods Kill) the song, MMJ didn’t just “pull it off”, they nailed them all.

On the final evening’s performance of their most recent studio album; Evil Urges, the band ran through the album’s funky Highly Suspicious to the emotional ballads of Librarian and Look At You, just as easily as they went from The Velvet Undergrounds beautiful Oh Sweet Nuthin to Sly & The Family Stone’s Hot Fun In The Summertime in their encore.

As MMJ left the stage after their incredible encore, (which also included their soulful cover of Curtis Mayfield’s Move On Up) the crowd was not ready to be done with the week of My Morning Jacket. The energy was at the weeks all time high and the band too was at their peak as they came back to give the crowd what they wanted…One Big Holiday! A track that has become the traditional closing song at all MMJ shows over the last few years. This week has definitely been “One Big Holiday” for me as I took the week off to travel to witness MMJ history. During the week I personally met the band several times and was able to have MMJ autograph their entire vinyl catalogue and acquire a setlist from each night’s performance. This incredible gesture from the band members hit the high note for me. Here is a picture of the collection from my week with MMJ (minus the album “Z” which was signed previously and left at home in the TSL vinyl library)…

For those of you who love MMJ and were able to attend this weeks magical run at NYC’s Terminal 5 here’s a brief recap of what you were privy too:
100 songs– 99 different, One Big Holiday as the lone repeated tune
79 MMJ originals– of which 63 were MMJ album tracks, the rest
b-sides, unreleased, or carl broemel original
20 covers– 19 different artists, Velvet Underground being the sole
repeat artist covered.
And for those of you who missed it, well at least you can watch my videos…

http://www.youtube.com/user/thesignaturelibrary?feature=mhum