Lou Barlow plays marathon show with Wye Oak at Cat's Cradle

All photos by Kevin Norris

Two Merge Records labelmates, Lou Barlow and the Missingmen and Wye Oak, rolled into Carrboro Thursday night for a low-key show at the Cat's Cradle. While the crowd was small, maybe about a hundred people at the highest point, Barlow still put on a marathon show, playing 24 songs.

Barlow opened by himself, playing acoustic versions of many older tunes starting with the Folk Implosion song "Mechanical Man." Other old tunes included the Sebadoh songs "Magnet's Coil," "Skull" and "Too Pure."

After seven songs, Barlow was joined by The Missingmen for a rambunctious rock set featuring mostly songs from Barlow's latest album Goodnight Unknown and the band's mini-album = Sentridoh III. The band was electric, both literally and figuratively.

After about 11 songs, the band left the stage while Barlow stuck around and fielding requests from audience, knocking some down and joking about them while accepting many of them. He played the old Sebadoh song "Willing To Wait," which he said he rarely plays because it reminds him of the crappy video that Sub Pop pushed him to make for the song that cost about $120,000. The song was and is still fantastic.

After spending the night mocking one request to play the old Sebadoh tune "Homemade," Barlow chose to close the night with it. Much earlier in the night he noted that the song was about masturbation and getting high, noting that he's now 44 years old and the song just is not cool anymore. It seems fitting that he decided to close the show with it.

Baltimore duo Wye Oak opened the show with a short set of their beautiful yet gritty pop. The duo played mostly songs from their latest album The Knot, but dropped a few new songs into the set, "Holy Holy" and "Hottest Day," which singer/guitarist Jenn Wasner said will be on their new album which they are currently recording.

They closed their eight song set with the sorrowful yet thunderous song "For Prayer," from The Knot. I've only seen the band a few times, but that song is a show stopper every time.

[Sorry for the quality of the photos here. The lighting at the Cat's Cradle has been pretty bad lately, but for this show it was just abysmal. They've got the front lights but insist on only using back lighting which really sucks. Hopefully it'll be better in the future.]

Lou Barlow set list
Mechanical Man
Magnet's Coil
Skull
Puzzle
Too Pure
I'm Thinking
Apologize
Home
?
?
Too Much Freedom
?
Gravitate
One Machine
Caterpillar Girl
?
Losercore
Soul and Fire
Cliche
Willing To Wait
Brand New Love
Take Advantage
Homemade


Wye Oak set list
?
That I Do
?
Holy Holy
Take It In
Hottest Day
I Hope You Die
For Prayer

Lou Barlow + the Missingmen





Wye Oak