Umphrey's McGee at Penns Peak - Jim Thorpe, PA 1/22
words: Brian Overton | Photos: Alex Buschiazzo
If you have been around the music scene for a long time you have definitely heard the saying “Never miss a Sunday show”. This past Sunday the quiet town of Jim Thorpe hosted the progressive/aggressive rock n' roll super group, Umphrey’s McGee. Mother nature set the tone for the evening as travelers braved the dense fog that was surrounding and taking over the mountains. Penn’s Peak is a magical venue at the peak of mountain overlooking breathtaking valleys and the horizon. Due to the venue's unique and remote location, most people attending the show traveled some ways to be there, on a Sunday...in the dense fog, all for the love of the Umph. After two consecutive nights at the National in Virginia with Spafford from Colorado, this particular show was billed as “An Evening with Umphrey’s McGee” with no opener.
The evening kicked off in very special way with Brendan Bayliss and Jake Cinninger on acoustic guitars, a rarity that only happens but a hand full of times a year. Brendan and Jake, although having different tastes in guitar on electric, play the same exact guitar when they play acoustic creating a magical blend of tones and harmonics. The evening started off with “Gone for Good”, which just recently debuted in 2016 as the theme song to their first archival documentary full-length movie, Reel to Real. This then led into an amazingly dead-on cover of The Pixies “Where is my Mind”. The cover was incredibly well done all around with Brendan belting out the vocals and keyboard player Joel Cummins nailing the background vocals. From there the band went into “The Great American”, from their double album, “The Bottom Half”. This song is a whimsical instrumental that tells a story through music. The song segued into “The Pequod”, which is named after a reference to a fictional fishing boat represented in the classic novel Moby Dick, which then segued back into “The Great American” and would end the band's unannounced acoustic portion of the show.
A band like Umphrey’s McGee, although well versed in the art of acoustic is like a caged wild animal until they play electric. They proved this to be true as they strapped on their guitars and slammed into “Wappy Sprayberry”. This song is band favorite that really gives them the ability to stretch their wings in an intricate way with major changes in timing and progression. The song stretched a ways and dove into “Believe the Lie”. This song has become an electric song over the years since the original version appeared acoustic on “The Bottom Half” as well. From there we traveled into the band's satirically named song “Nothing Too Fancy”, which is indeed something very fancy, intricate, and musically diverse in comparison to the average jam band song. NTF gave way to the song “Syncopated Strangers”, which featured guitarists Jake and Brendan along with Ryan Stasik on bass, dancing in sync as they played. Syncopated dumped into a hard rock heavy “Dump City” to close out the first set.
After a short break the band returned with their game faces on and blasting into another musical journey with their vocal heavy favorite, “2x2”. 2x2 is another song that is full of improvisational ability flowing in and out of segments as they returned to “Syncopated” and rolled back into “2x2”. From there the band went into one of their oldest tunes, “August”, with rich vocals wailing lead lines. Next came “Robot World” which is a song that is very true to its title. Chris Myers shows his diversity with elaborate high hat work and the blending of electronic and acoustic drums with percussionist Andy Farag accentuating and complimenting him all the while. This song is a musical journey all its own that is very heavily based in drop tuning and heavy metal influences as well as piercing electro synthesizer. This instrumental excursion paved the way for “Resolution”, a happy bouncy tune that helped clear the smog lingering from the world of robots. The song briefly enters the belly of the beast as the bounciness is interjected with brief demonic messages and back into bounciness with tingling teases of “Norwegian Wood”. Check out the video from Robot World below.
The band then went into “Bad Poker” which really brought the spirit of mountains with their very own brand of country bluegrass. After the momentary hoedown, the band would finish out their set with an epic “All in Time” that started as a “Divisions” tease to finish out the evening. After a few moments the band returned to the stage a delivered another monster cover, “Miss Gradenko” originally written by The Police. This rocking cover segued into a return to “Nothing to Fancy” which finished out the evening in an excellently energetic way. Jefferson Waful provided another amazing evening of spectacular lighting coordination and Umphrey’s McGee delivered another amazing evening of surprise acoustic arrangements, prog-rock sorcery, extensive jams, and an all out marvelous night of music in the foggy mountains of Jim Thorpe, PA.
The evening kicked off in very special way with Brendan Bayliss and Jake Cinninger on acoustic guitars, a rarity that only happens but a hand full of times a year. Brendan and Jake, although having different tastes in guitar on electric, play the same exact guitar when they play acoustic creating a magical blend of tones and harmonics. The evening started off with “Gone for Good”, which just recently debuted in 2016 as the theme song to their first archival documentary full-length movie, Reel to Real. This then led into an amazingly dead-on cover of The Pixies “Where is my Mind”. The cover was incredibly well done all around with Brendan belting out the vocals and keyboard player Joel Cummins nailing the background vocals. From there the band went into “The Great American”, from their double album, “The Bottom Half”. This song is a whimsical instrumental that tells a story through music. The song segued into “The Pequod”, which is named after a reference to a fictional fishing boat represented in the classic novel Moby Dick, which then segued back into “The Great American” and would end the band's unannounced acoustic portion of the show.
A band like Umphrey’s McGee, although well versed in the art of acoustic is like a caged wild animal until they play electric. They proved this to be true as they strapped on their guitars and slammed into “Wappy Sprayberry”. This song is band favorite that really gives them the ability to stretch their wings in an intricate way with major changes in timing and progression. The song stretched a ways and dove into “Believe the Lie”. This song has become an electric song over the years since the original version appeared acoustic on “The Bottom Half” as well. From there we traveled into the band's satirically named song “Nothing Too Fancy”, which is indeed something very fancy, intricate, and musically diverse in comparison to the average jam band song. NTF gave way to the song “Syncopated Strangers”, which featured guitarists Jake and Brendan along with Ryan Stasik on bass, dancing in sync as they played. Syncopated dumped into a hard rock heavy “Dump City” to close out the first set.
After a short break the band returned with their game faces on and blasting into another musical journey with their vocal heavy favorite, “2x2”. 2x2 is another song that is full of improvisational ability flowing in and out of segments as they returned to “Syncopated” and rolled back into “2x2”. From there the band went into one of their oldest tunes, “August”, with rich vocals wailing lead lines. Next came “Robot World” which is a song that is very true to its title. Chris Myers shows his diversity with elaborate high hat work and the blending of electronic and acoustic drums with percussionist Andy Farag accentuating and complimenting him all the while. This song is a musical journey all its own that is very heavily based in drop tuning and heavy metal influences as well as piercing electro synthesizer. This instrumental excursion paved the way for “Resolution”, a happy bouncy tune that helped clear the smog lingering from the world of robots. The song briefly enters the belly of the beast as the bounciness is interjected with brief demonic messages and back into bounciness with tingling teases of “Norwegian Wood”. Check out the video from Robot World below.
The band then went into “Bad Poker” which really brought the spirit of mountains with their very own brand of country bluegrass. After the momentary hoedown, the band would finish out their set with an epic “All in Time” that started as a “Divisions” tease to finish out the evening. After a few moments the band returned to the stage a delivered another monster cover, “Miss Gradenko” originally written by The Police. This rocking cover segued into a return to “Nothing to Fancy” which finished out the evening in an excellently energetic way. Jefferson Waful provided another amazing evening of spectacular lighting coordination and Umphrey’s McGee delivered another amazing evening of surprise acoustic arrangements, prog-rock sorcery, extensive jams, and an all out marvelous night of music in the foggy mountains of Jim Thorpe, PA.
Set 1: Gone for Good[1], Where Is My Mind?[1], Great American[1] > The Pequod[1] > Great American[1], Wappy Sprayberry > Believe the Lie, Nothing Too Fancy > Syncopated Strangers >Dump City
Set 2: 2x2 > Syncopated Strangers > 2x2, August, Robot World > Resolution[2] > Bad Poker, All In Time[3]
Encore: Miss Gradenko[4] > Nothing Too Fancy
[1] with Brendan and Jake on acoustics
[2] with Norwegian Wood (The Beatles) jam
[3] with Divisions intro
[4] with Crazy Train (Ozzy Osbourne) jam
Purchase via UMLive: 01.22.2017, Penn's Peak, Jim Thorpe, PA
Setlist provided by allthings.umphreys.com
Set 2: 2x2 > Syncopated Strangers > 2x2, August, Robot World > Resolution[2] > Bad Poker, All In Time[3]
Encore: Miss Gradenko[4] > Nothing Too Fancy
[1] with Brendan and Jake on acoustics
[2] with Norwegian Wood (The Beatles) jam
[3] with Divisions intro
[4] with Crazy Train (Ozzy Osbourne) jam
Purchase via UMLive: 01.22.2017, Penn's Peak, Jim Thorpe, PA
Setlist provided by allthings.umphreys.com
