Clearwater, Florida Roll Call

[elle]

http://www.tampabay.com/features/mus...cle1195497.ece

Review: Lindsey Buckingham fills small Capitol Theatre with huge tunes and guitar-picking talent

By Sean Daly, Times Pop Music Critic
In Print: Friday, October 7, 2011

[DOUGLAS R. CLIFFORD | Times]
Lindsey Buckingham performs before a sold-out crowd Wednesday at the Capitol Theatre in Clearwater.
Entertainment


CLEARWATER — There was a moment Wednesday, during Fleetwood Mac's sour-patch Big Love, when it looked as if Lindsey Buckingham had 13 fingers. So fast, so passionate was his picking, the fretboard was covered in digits, like a blurry special effect from the Six Million Dollar Man.

But alas, like any mortal dude — or, for that matter, rock god — the 62-year-old sports 10 fingers, and such was the intimacy of the venue, every one of the 437 fans in the sold-out crowd were close enough to count for themselves.

Has Buckingham ever played a hall as intimate as the Capitol Theatre? Not counting his Southern California bathroom?

It was a surreal night for sure, but a privilege too, as Buckingham, on solo hiatus from his Mac mates, spent two hours making weird sonic magic in a joint no bigger than a jewelry box.

With his hair still high and his pinched handsome face touched by graying age, Buckingham took the stage alone at first, playing his own Shut Us Down, Go Insane, Trouble, voice and guitar blending, bending in a jangly metallic waterfall. He's smart enough to rearrange his hits but make sure their essence lingers.

The acoustics are crazy good at the Capitol, a dream spot for a studio wonk like Buckingham, who demands a sterling canvas for his trickery. He'd eventually bring three players out to join him, adding even more trippy layers. You'd pay attention at first, then, like Alice down the rabbit hole, you'd zoom off in your buzzy brain only to be dragged back by his "Ooh yeah!" yelps and euphoric guitar faces.

A little frazzled by the size and in-your-lap closeness of the venue, the rock icon would get distracted at times, the glare off his guitars bouncing around the teeny room. "It's like a death ray!" he laughed. "I'll have to be careful where I point that."

There were no references to his recent and unlikely Saturday Night Live fame, but alas, the famously intense guy was funnier, chummier than expected.

Buckingham's new album, this year's Seeds We Sow, lacks the hooks and sing-along-ability of his better work. But at the very least, he's always interesting, odd, out-there, and new stuff like Stars Are Crazy and the wistfully epic End of Time kept you rapt and curious nonetheless.

Buckingham would sneak in a few Fleetwood Mac gems, of course, ignoring most of the broad-stroke hits and going for the more personal ones: Never Going Back Again, Second Hand News, Tusk and, of course, Big Love. For that last one, he was like the coolest minstrel in the castle, his baroque fingerpicking style adapted for modern surge.

For all the smallness of the show, Buckingham wasn't afraid to go arena-style for one final wallop, riding a big booming intro, counting off 1-2-3 and then: "Loving you / Isn't the right thing to do / How can I ever change things / That I feel?"

So good! Go Your Own Way got the middle-aged crowd to its stomping feet, and Buckingham set that death ray on stun, picking out a high ringing riff that tested the walls of the house. It was fun, it was ferocious, and one more time, just to make sure, you counted those fingers.

Sean Daly can be reached at [email protected] or (727) 893-8467. His Pop Life blog is at tampabay.com/blogs/poplife.


[Last modified: Oct 06, 2011 05:36 PM]

[elle]

http://cltampa.com/tampa/live-review...8#.TpI4t_4k6sp

Live review: Lindsey Buckingham at the Capitol Theatre, Clearwater
The Fleetwood Mac singer-guitarist woos an appreciative crowd with tasteful ease.

by GABE ECHAZABAL and TRACY MAY
click to enlarge

Some believe the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It's an adage that's proven time and again when a band member with an inflated ego decides to take center stage and fly solo into his or her own career path. More often than not, the results are disappointing and unspectacular. But Lindsey Buckingham obviously doesn't subscribe to that maxim. The guitar virtuoso who has served as an integral part of Fleetwood Mac, arguably one of the hugest and most successful bands of the rock era, has no qualms about breaking away from the enormous Mac machine and basking in the spotlight to show off his many solo talents. A small but passionate crowd of 437 tightly-packed bodies at Clearwater's cozy Capitol Theatre was treated to an intimate evening with Buckingham on Wednesday night and, it's safe to say, it was an evening anyone in attendance won't soon forget. [Text by Gabe, photos by Tracy.]

The tall, lanky guitarist appeared silently on the small stage casually clad in black t-shirt, black leather jacket and jeans at around 8:10 p.m., and without a word, picked up one of his many guitars and launched into a haunting acoustic version of "It Was You," one of the standout tracks from his fantastic 2006 album Under The Skin. Buckingham occupied the stage alone for the first five numbers of the night before inviting his fine three-piece band onstage to round out the sound. But it was the night's early, stripped-down readings that gave the clearest insight into the eerie genius that festers inside the brain of Buckingham. Lyrically, his compositions have often been riddled with themes of paranoia, neurosis and isolation. His well-documented history of conflicts and relationship battles within the Fleetwood Mac sect has no doubt propagated his penchant for composing his own brand of twisted, tortured tunes. "Go Insane," the title track from his 1984 release, reared its manic head more effectively and intensely than ever before fueled only by Buckingham's always jaw-dropping guitar work and his impassioned screams and yelps.

Vocally, Lindsey hasn't lost an iota of the range that made him such a soaring ingredient of the Fleetwood Mac sound and it's fair to say that he's actually learned to manipulate his vocal skills more effectively later in his career. A bare-bones, stripped down rendition of the gargantuan Mac staple "Tusk" benefited from the flawless whisper to a scream and back to a whisper vocal treatment it was enveloped in. And oh yeah ... there's that phenomenal, wildly original and awe-inspiring ability to make a guitar sound like quite no one else in the business. Buckingham's unorthodox picking and strumming style has been his trademark for decades, but it's really a fascinating sight to behold and listen to in this type of intimate setting. He didn't fail to wow the adoring crowd with his guitar antics and drew several spontaneous standing ovations as a result.

Buckingham kept his between-song stage patter to a minimum. He spoke of the differences in collaborating with Mac as opposed to his solo touring band as well as offering a few inspirational quips about feeling young and continuing to be inspired to do what he does. And, in a humorous moment, he was particularly tickled with the shimmering, trippy reflections his guitars were projecting on the side walls of the theater.

Juggling between the Mac catalog of hits ("Go Your Own Way," "Big Love") and its deeper album cuts ("Second Hand News," "Never Going Back Again"), Buckingham was able to seamlessly integrate plenty of his fantastic solo work into the setlist. Most notable were the selections from Seeds We Sow, his outstanding new and very personal record. While most in the audience seemed unfamiliar with the newer material, they seemed to be just as entranced with it as with the more recognizable fare.

After two encores and almost two hours later, Buckingham ended the evening with two of his most memorable compositions of recent years: "Treason" from his stellar 2008 release, Gift of Screws, and the title track off Seeds We Sow. A bold move for sure, to end the night with such fresh, potentially unrecognizable songs, but it's a true testament and a wise move on the part of a man who obviously feels as strongly and as proudly of his solo work as he does of his better-know work with Fleetwood Mac.

It's refreshing to see a veteran artist with the amount of road savvy and experience that Buckingham possesses take his show on the road and play to small yet impassioned crowds. It's even more encouraging to see him deliver a show of this caliber instead of simply going through the motions. Buckingham can jump back aboard the Fleetwood Mac bandwagon any time time the group gets the itch to release a record or tour, but he most certainly has a self-fulfilling solo career to rely on as well.

SET LIST:

1. It Was You
2. Go Insane
3. Trouble
4. Never Going Back Again
5. Big Love
6. Under The Skin
7. All My Sorrows
8. In Our Own Time
9. Illumination
10. Second Hand News
11. Tusk
12. Stars Are Crazy
13. End of Time
14. That’s The Way Love Goes
15. Im So Afraid
16. Go Your Own Way

Encore
17. Turn It On
18. Treason

Second Encore
19. Seeds We Sow

Concert Review archives »

Tags: Concert Review, Concerts, Lindsey Buckingham, capitol theatre, clearwater

[bangdrum]

Originally Posted by elle

and without a word, picked up one of his many guitars and launched into a haunting acoustic version of "It Was You,"

Would pay double to see this.

Originally Posted by elle

After two encores and almost two hours later, Buckingham ended the evening with two of his most memorable compositions of recent years: "Treason" from his stellar 2008 release, Gift of Screws

He's still paying them!

Great review otherwise.

[michelej1]

Reading Steve Jobs' comments on the Beatles, of course, made me think of FM.

“My model for business is The Beatles. They were four guys who kept each other’s negative tendencies in check. And the total was greater than the sum of the parts."

[carol7lynn]

Still no Rock Away Blind. Hhhhhmmmm!

Carol-Lynn
SoCalGal