2018 Fall Tour Setlist

[NonPopulus]

Seeing a few shows on the Tour Across Canada got me really excited for the prospect of a Something Like a Storm Fall Tour with Matthew Good as the sole headliner. I love looking back at the various setlists, since he changes them up every night.

 

We’ve probably had threads like this before. Based on what we know about the setlists Matt has played on the previous couple of tours, Load Me Up, Apparitions, Weapon, and Born Losers are nightly staples. On the Tour Across Canada, he played Something Like a Storm and Strange Days at each show, so they could probably be considered safe bets. Additionally we know the band usually learns all of the new songs and maybe a deep cut or two. What would your ideal 16 song setlist be for the a fall tour?

 

Mine would be something like this:

 

The Rat Who Would Be King

Something Like a Storm

The Future is X-Rated

Bad Guys Win

Born Losers

There The First Time

Days Come Down

Strange Days

Advertising on Police Cars

Failing the Rorschach Test

Load Me Up / Carmelina

This is Night

Weapon

—————

Men at the Door

Apparitions

Bullets in a Briefcase

[adam_777]

Hmm it's an interesting question.  Matt's tours over the last decade have usually focused on a headlining tour shortly after an album release and then a secondary festival style tour later in the year or the next year.  The last time the headlining tour in support of a record was this distant from the records release has to be the Hospital Music full band tour, but that was proceeded by a headlining acoustic tour.  

Given that Something Like a Storm was largely recorded in late January 2017, by the time of the fall tour this year it would be at least 18 months since that album was recorded, which means perhaps Matt will be moving on from it a bit already and we may even get a preview of something new along the way depending if he has done any writing prior to it.  Even if we don't we may not see as many songs from Something Like A Storm in the setlist as was common on previous album tours.  Matt's also expressed in the past that he would like to look at the prospect of having headlining shows that feature slightly less of a current album than in the past, instead of 7-8 new songs a night, maybe we'll get 4-5.  You left Decades off your set, which is interesting.  Usually Matt makes a point of having the lead single from the current album a staple of the setlist.  I remember once on the Vancouver tour he hadn't played Last Parade and then started the encore off with it making a comment that he almost committed a faux pas by playing a show without playing the latest single.  But again with this tour being a ways from the release of this album perhaps he won't feel as tied to Decades especially since it has done two laps of the country now.  

I'm also not sure Matt could do Rat anymore.  That song is an absolute strain to sing, the muscles in your throat literally ache afterwards, and with his issues with post nasal drip and the like, I don't know if that one is something that can be done, I can't image trying to open a show with it at this point anyways that'd be damn difficult, as much as I'd love to hear it, I just don't see it.  

I think it's safe to say we'll probably see about half of SLAS played on any given night.  The band now knows most of those songs so no reason the majority of that album wouldn't be played and rotated night to night.  I think your standards: Load Me Up, Weapon, Apparitions, Born Losers will be played at most if not all shows.  Things like Hello Time Bomb, Strange Days, Alert Status Red and Advertising On Police Cars and X-Rated will probably be rotated in and out with some regularity.  I expect the odd deep cut off Beautiful Midnight because this band is well versed on them.  Beyond that I figure probably 2-3 new old songs will make appearances.  Apparently on the BM Revisted tour they were working on Avalanche which I'd love to see reappear back in the set after nearly a decade of absence.  With the next three albums on vinyl coming out, featuring a couple things from Lofi/Loser Anthems, Avalanche or Audio of Being might be a good way to push some extra album sales at the shows, or get those albums added to people's Christmas wishlists.  For the last five years or so those albums have been pretty sparsely represented in the set, inevitable with such a long recording history, but albums like Underdogs, Audio, Avalance and White Light were some of the biggest sellers of Matt's career and are often represented by just one song per tour (in some cases two) but usually it's the same songs from tour to tour.  In the last decade at full band shows Underdogs has been represented by Everything is Automatic (not usually a regular in the set)  and Apparitions Audio of Being by Carmelina (not usually a regular in the set) and Advertising on Police Cars,  Avalanche by While We Were Hunting Rabbits and Weapon, White Light by Alert Status Red (not usually a regular in the set) and It's Been a While Since I was Your Man (not usually a regular in the set) and Blue Skies Over Badlands.  Hospital Music has gotten a little more love over the last ten years with deeper cuts appearing occasionally as encores, but Vancouver-Chaotic Neutral songs all but disappeared after the touring cycles for those albums were finished.  

So yeah based on all of that I don't expect a lot of change to the format we've been seeing for quite some time now.  From a business stand point it is working well for matt he has a stable fanbase that really enjoy his shows, myself included.  Of course as a diehard fan I'd love to see more setlist variation, but over the last few years it's become clear it just isn't something totally plausible.  I've often wondered why Matt doesn't take a "An Evening with Matthew Good" approach to a tour once.  Have no opener and do a Neil Young style show where you start it off solo acoustic for like 5-6 songs, and then do the full band thing for 15 tracks.  The show could be 2:15-2:30 so not a ridiculous length of time extra and would allow for matt to inject a greater variety because the acoustic set wouldn't have to be limited to just the hits because they would surely be coming in the electric set.  It gets around the issue of having to pay all this extra money for rehearsal time with the band to learn a large variety of new songs because Matt could conceivably just learn a dozen or so acoustic songs at home and rotate them in and out throughout the tour.  Also, its not like the crowd would diminish because of no opener, because everyone is there for Matt anyways.  To me that style of show would address the setlist and financial concerns Matt has put forward in the past, without involving anything truly ridiculous.  The only limitation would be if he didn't feel he could physically perform for that long. But he seems to regularly do shows pushing two hours without difficulty, and that extra length would be acoustic songs so you're not totally rocking out either.  I think a scenario like that is the only realistic way we'll see vast changes to the current setlist structure.  

[andydanger85]

He did allude to this big tour allowing him to go on a typical solo tour later this year, explicitly. I think it may have been before he deleted his account here, but I might be wrong. That said, those plans may have changed given his sickness and it being seemingly harder this time around away from family.

I tend to agree with you guys in that it will probably be the standard setlist with a few goodies thrown in. Probably bits and pieces from the BM tour, maybe a Cold Water or a Harridan, but mostly SLAS and hits.



 

[Curtster]

This would be my dream (somewhat) realistic set list for a fall tour:

 

Prime Time Deliverance (solo electric, he did it in Buffalo in 2014, it's on youtube)

A Single Explosion

Decades

Load Me Up/Carmelina

The Future is X-Rated

There the First Time

Something Like a Storm

A Boy and His Machine Gun

Bad Guys Win

Born Losers

Days Come Down

Apparitions (solo acoustic)

 

Encore:

Strange Days (solo acoustic)

The Fine Art of Falling Apart (solo acoustic)

Giant

Hello Time Bomb

Weapon

Edited April 8, 2018 by Curtster

[folk singer]

this is probably not that realistic.... but, who knows:

 

Bad Guys Win

load me up/Carmelina

decades

Born losers

blue skies over badlands (or Non populus)

hello time bomb

days come down

strange days

Men at the door

Giant

Cloudbusting

There the first time

advertising on police cars

Bullets in a Briefcase 

 

encore 1:

Fine art of falling apart (acoustic)

prime time deliverance (acoustic)

Apparitions (acoustic)

 

encore 2:

something like a storm

Everything is Automatic

weapon

 

[Stwlegend]

Always thought an updated version of 21st century with Matt’s live commentary would be good to bring back on one of these upcoming tours.

It’s the perfect atmosphere for something like that.  Not sure if he would go that direction anymore but hearing the different takes back in the Avalanche era was fun. A way to sneak in an older song and get a little more out of it.

[Crusader]

Dropped by the show in New West. Was great but wet.

[NonPopulus]

That’s a good one-two punch to get the crowd into it.

[finboy]

I would love to see the cover of ahead by a century that Matt did for a calgary private show.