The Divine Comedy (Cafe Du Nord, 22 September 2004)

Beer Rating: 1 1/2 beers

Neil Hannon is a true genius. The man can entertain, make jokes, write sarcastic (and sometimes overly cheezy) lyrics, and write some of the finest songs around. The entire Divine Comedy discography is chock full of fantastic songs and a much, much smaller Divine Comedy played a good sampling of their songs (and others) during their 2-day residency at Cafe Du Nord.

Neil was accompanied by two other musicians (whose names escape me at the moment) and opened their set with "Absent Friends," which is the opening track to their new L.P. of the same title. Neil was in top form, looking dapper in a suit and now donning a much better haircut. Throughout the show, he joked with the crowd, introducing himself as Neil "Mr. Burns" and introducing the next song as, "this is a song...thank you." Notable songs he played in his main set included "Happy Goth," "Woman of the World," "National Express," "If...," and "Love What You Do."

The highlight of the evening though was when they would play a cover. In their main set, they did an astoundingly pleasing rendition of the Queen of the Stone Age's song, "No One Knows." I personally hate that song, but Neil actually made it a pleasurable one - sounding as if it was his song in the first place. During the encore, Neil took requests from the crowd. The first request he granted was New Order's "Blue Monday" which he played in part since he forgot the lyrics. Then came "The Logical Song" by Supertramp, which was done almost in full but fantastic nonetheless. They noted that they were doing this song during soundcheck and decided to download the lyrics off the web. Another one they did was "Macarthur Park" by Richard Harris which Neil found very difficult to play that he cursed music. Finally, he ended his cover set with Supergrass' "Alright" which was also done in part.

The band ended their set with "Tonight We Fly." A perfect way to end the nearly 90 minute set. After the show, I did feel as if I were in Cloud 9. I would like to go to their second show, but Rilo Kiley awaits...