W I L C O -- Jeff Tweedy & Co. rock the Greek

I saw Wilco perform last night at the Berkeley Greek Theatre, and all I can say is--wow. The weather was perfect, the real Big Dipper hung in the sky above the stage, and frontman Jeff Tweedy was in fine form, his voice at full throttle thanks to this being the first show of their summer tour, leaving him well-rested and fully present. Tweedy also mentioned that he just quit smoking not long ago, so that may have helped, too. He's put on quite a few pounds since I last saw him last November at the Paramount in Oakland (he stuck his gut out at one point to show the audience), but he sang and played as well as I've ever seen him. The rest of the band was right there with Tweedy throughout the show, but it was clearly his show all the way (but not in a selfish sense). They opened with "Misunderstood" and went on from there through an excellent set list that included "Hummingbird," "Handshake Drugs," "California Stars" and "Kingpin" among many others, ending finally with "Heavy Metal Drummer." If they play anywhere near you on this summer tour, I highly recommend scoring a ticket.

There aren't many bands out there right now that I get truly excited over, to be honest, but Wilco is definitely one of them. And they are currently in top form. Tweedy has been clean (off prescription drugs) for about a year now, I read, and he himself said during the show that he was feeling "happy, in a sad way" but that seemed to translate into great music. At one point late in the show Tweedy was playing an acoustic tune (I'll name it soon), there was a brief pause, and some guy from the crowd yelled out, "Jeff Tweedy, you're beautiful" to which Tweedy kind of turned in his direction and continued with the song, the next lyrics being, "the music was my savior." And in that moment, as they say, it all came together. Or, as an old hippie once said after a Bob Dylan show I saw at the Berkeley High School auditorium years ago, "Oh man, that was the furthest."

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