Jason Lytle of Grandaddy
Café Du Nord, San Francisco, CA
August 9, 2006

JK called at about 9:15 surprised that I hadn't left the East Bay yet. He said it was a rapidly-filling seated show. I asked him to grab me seats. When my wife and I got there, he had saved us two. Thanks, Jeff!

Nik Freitas was playing when we arrived. Solo singer/songwriter guy from Visalia doing low-key numbers on keyboards and acoustic guitar. Pretty and nice, but nothing that really blew me away. He was a great whistler, though, and his enunciation was perfect. I don't think I've ever understood so many lyrics during a live show. I bought his $5 CD, but haven't listened to it, yet.

The stage was set with a small table and a lamp with keyboards, some percussion, and acoustic guitars. It looked like someone's living room, especially with everybody sitting down quietly talking.

Jason Lytle took the stage after a short break, during which I unsuccessfully tried to eliminate the aisle in front of our stools, which had become an artery to the bathroom. He was accompanied by Rusty Miller of the Sacramento band Jackpot. After saying hello to the audience the two of them launched into "Summer It's Gone" from the final Grandaddy album, Just Like the Fambly Cat. Total beauty of a song and one of my favorites on that album. Jason's mournful, high-pitched vocals just kill. A little later they played a great version of "Lost the Go in the Go-For-It" from Sumday.

Then they did some Sophtware Slump songs about everybody's favorite robot, Jed. On "Jed the Humanoid," Lytle managed to slip in all the syllables of Jägermeister into a line in the last chorus. Then he laughed, jumbling the next few lines. Good stuff. They played my favorite Grandaddy song, "Chartsengrafs." The two-man version they did was great, adding a melty, psychedelic chunk and a retarded blues breakdown to smiles and applause. Before going into "Hewlett's Daughter," Lytle cracked some joke about "trying to save America's resources."

This is a totally different Lytle than I have seen in previous shows. The first time I saw them was the week before Sophtware Slump came out at the Starry Plough in Berkeley. That night they came across as a fun group of guys drinking beer and hanging out, but on subsequent Grandaddy and solo Lytle shows, especially when I saw them open for Elliott Smith, Lytle seemed removed; out of his element. It was really good to see him smile so much as going through the songs. He mentioned a recent move to Montana - maybe getting out of Modesto has helped.
On a song about 37D, Lytle explained, "I wrote this song to cure my fear of airplanes. I hate to give up control, but you can't have it on a jumbo jet." This is also key insight into the former Grandaddy, essentially a solo project from the beginning with Lytle doing the bulk of the studio work. The song is a winner - towards the end when the plane is apparently going down, there is this great lyric: "fuck, I finally found the picture of you and now everything is on fire."

Some more songs I recognized were "Elevate Myself," "The Saddest Vacant Lot in All the World," "Down With the Animals," and "Jeez Louise." They did a sad take of "Everything Beautiful is Far Away." There were also some new songs, or maybe they were Jackpot songs. Either way, I was really impressed by how well the two of them pulled off songs that are so extravagant on record. When they both busted out recorders my wife said, "That's some serious fourth grade shit right there!"

Before leaving, Lytle implored us to buy Freitas' record, noting that "it has lots of funny overdubs: drums... bass... multi-vocals." The mood in the room was great; lots of smiles. Awesome show. I hope Montana doesn't keep him away.

By Nate Daly

www.grandaddylandscape.com
www.nikfreitas.com
www.cafedunord.com

8/2006