Worst shows?

The only bad show this tour that I witnessed, and by leaps and bounds the worst BJ show I have seen to date, was Tulsa, OK. The only suprise of the night was Open All Night, which is a much bigger suprise than what I was expecting.

The set list was just a shorter mix of the previous two nights in Dallas without any of the benefits of Bed of Roses, LTOR, or Homebound Train. Crap, short setlist aside, what really sucked was Jon defining the word autopilot and the complete lack of interaction. The most he interacted was an unenergetic, "Hey Tulsa. Uh, how have you been the last 20 years?" And that's it. The rest was = Bad Name cue nails and WGIGO cue one hand in the air, I wanna hear you scream. Jon's voice was fine. The band was fine. It just seemed like it was the last place they wanted to be.

2006 OKC, was their first time to play Oklahoma in 15 (?) years. I bought 20 tickets and brought all my friends and they rocked. They did not disappoint. Back again, on the LH tour, the night after Dallas (which to date probably the best performance/energy I have seen), and they were about 75%... that's fine. I chalked it up to maxing out the night before. But this last tour, with a day of rest after back to back shows in Dallas, they didn't come to play.

Why does Jon go on auto-pilot? Is it because they have sung some of the songs for 20 years? If they don't have new (or rare) songs that make it onto the set list and add something new to the night, I can see how auto-pilot would come into play given singing some of those songs 100s of times. Even if they are great songs, it would be hard to mine something new in them.

I recall him saying that he can tell how the concert is going to go in the first 30 seconds of hitting the stage. If he doesn't make an immediate connection with the audience, is that when he sometimes goes on auto-pilot? Or is it associated with being tired or ill or bored with touring?

See, I really liked that gig. A good few change ups, and the one time I got Thorn In My Side. Probably getting upgraded to near the Circle clouded my view of that one, but it was definitely better than the first night and the 22nd June one was was a snoozefest.

Athens the worst show??? NOOO.. not at all! sorry but I strongly disagree with this..
I've seen BJ perform live many times through all these years and I can say that this was the kind of crowd many bands would love to have in their concerts! maybe the only crowd that can equally be compared with London's 1995!
I'm sure the band loved the audience's response during that night despite of the heat! you can tell that they were satisfied by watching Jon coming out of the circle many times during that night.. and the flowers during "Bed Of Roses" were a beautiful surprise!
even though the band had to perform during that extremely hot night they made it very very well! maybe the heat is responsible for the short list but it's not easy performing under 40'C (not to mention that on the stage and under the lights the temperature is higher!)
I can say that Athens was a very nice show.. I traveled looong distance just to watch them because I knew this was their first time in Athens (remember ''Athina.. finally >3!!'') definitely worth it! after this I'm sure they'll come back to Athens next tour!

H-U-L-L

I think Hull has become the benchemark of a bad concert !!

Like many others here, I'm voting for Hull as well. I've seen Jon in a bad mood a number of occasions, however never quite on the scale of Hull. No crowd interaction, no band interacton, occasional uncalled for rants and a general bad temper. You could tell he didn't want to play that night and he let everyone know just that! For once, it had nothing to do with the setlist and was purely based on a poor performance. We all have bad days at work, but this was something else. He even admitted in a interview when he was back in the states that 'Hull not my best performance'. Yeah, you got that right Jon! Fucking understatement!

I'm pretty sure Hull came up during the Dublin Q&A (can't remember if Jon brought it up or someone who asked a question) and it was kinda one of those things that everyone understood how bad it was.

I know everyone thinks Hull is the worst but no way in my opinion, July 11, 1989, Largo, MD. The band were all visibly over each other at that point, and Richie and Jon were at odds. Jon would try and talk to Richie (it was his birthday afterall) and Richie would just turn his back and ignore him as if he didn't hear him. No lie, by the end of the show, Jon looked like he was ready to cry!! I walked out of that show thinking..the band is OVER if they make it through this tour.

You're right Deb - I have a bootleg of that show and you can see the attitude all over the place. And yet a month later they went on to do that magnificent performance in Moscow which is one of my favorites.