Being lazy, I seem to have scanned stuff before writing comments. Suffice it to say Melissa was in fine form Saturday night, and received a warm welcome from Chicago. This was at least her 3rd appearance at Schuba's, the first I recall was when she opened for Peter Himmelman and I stood outside the door to the performance room, getting glimpses of the woman in a blue shirt whenever waiters would open the door, or the inevitable passing crowd for an opening act. Second time was as "the main event" in 1995. Also during 1995, she opened for Del Amitri at The Double Door down in Wicker Park/Bucktown, but unfortunately I was out of town so missed the chance to catch another opening set. (actually I was in New York City when she opened for Del Amitri at The Mercury Lounge, but I had specifically arranged to attend a different show that night, so was doubly hexed!
Other Ferrick-listers attending Saturday night's show included Yellow Brick Road (a.k.a Kathleen of Chicago's Les-bi-Gay Radio) and Meloni (a.k.a. Mary). If others were there, let me know at "carolyn at house-of-music.com" (remove spaces and "quotes" from address, substitute @ for at). Sorry we didn't get a chance to meet.
The Set List In Melissa's own handMelissa did a mix of material from both of her albums - Massive Blur and Willing to Wait - and her new cassette, Made of Honor (cool acoustic arrangements, by the way. Naturally there was a broken string, near the end (help, Kathleen - what song?), which caused her to have to set aside the Takamine with the hole in the soundboard for her "backup guitar" - and apologize several times for its sound. (didn't notice it being that bad, nor did the rest of the a udience seem to). As a result, she ended the show sitting on a stool - because someone had stolen her guitar strap!
Her encore included not only "Jessie's Girl" - the Rick Springfield hit from the 80s, with a humorous introduction - but also audience requests "Happy Song" and "Juliana Hatfield Song" - with her usual varied medley of other "girl with guitar [or piano]" type artists.
Trivial pursuits - the woman actually has put pennies (or some kind of coins) in her penny loafers. Another song lyric addition which got a big reaction from the audience was at the end of "Gotta Go Now", where she added references to "what'll happen if they let us get married" and moving to Hawaii!
It's a wrap!
My Ferrick index page - with other Ferrick links of interest
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