The Long Winters, Full Of Themselves And That's Okay

Saturday night, a cool fifty degrees downtown. Parked on Western. Climbed the stairs to the market. Crossed the street at 1st & Pike. Something special in the air -- we could feel it.

The Long Winters were finally back home in Seattle after a long tour of the U.S. and Europe and would be playing our favorite venue, the Showbox. Spacious yet intimate, stylish but not too hoity-toity -- we like the Showbox because we can show up early, have a drink in the Green Room and then be one of the first inside, or we can show up late and still have plenty of room to navigate our way to the stage.

The short story: The Long Winters were simply amazing Saturday night. Lead man John Roderick warned us from the beginning:

"This is kind of a special night for us, so uh, I hope you don't mind, but we're going to play an extra long set tonight. If you've got a babysitter waiting at home, you might be shelling out another twenty."

Mind? Please. Do your thing, gentlemen.

And so they did. Throughout the night we were taken by all the energy both onstage and off. We're not sure if the show was sold out, but the place was definitely full and everyone seemed to be having a great time. Seattlest, our friend, and everyone else nearest the stage danced our collective asses off. Observation: Everyone seemed to be in love with Mr. Roderick. Including us. Hey, he's charming, mildly handsome, and has a cocksure bravado befitting rock stardom. But it's the way he carries it that's most entertaining. He soaks up the attention, revels in it even and then plays it up for the crowd -- but at the same time, doesn't take himself seriously at all. That's a rock star. Yet another observation: We're pretty sure that every one of Seattle's beautiful women were in attendance Saturday night (Except, of course, Mrs. Seattlest and all of our female contributors).

Also in attendance: Special guest Ben Gibbard who took over on drums for one song. Oh how we love surprises.

As the set pushed on, the band caught a case of the sillies and broke into a spot-on rendition of Aerosmith's Walk This Way, wherein John Roderick artfully spit the first verse Run DMC style. "Give us an Inch, we'll take a mile," John said after the band put a stop to it and returned to form.

Final highlight of the evening: No encores. Seriously. "We're not doing an encore tonight," John called out. "Instead we're just going to keep playing more songs. We're not going to leave the stage and make you stand out here clapping and calling us back out. You don't have to do anything. Just keep enjoying the show."

John's right. Encores are dumb. There must have been a time when they were worth something -- when they were genuine. But today we all know that band's coming back out. We all know there's at least two, maybe three or four songs left before the show is really done. So, rock bands of Seattle, enough with the encores. Let's start a new trend. No encores. It's more impressive anyway when you rock your ass off and then end on a solid note. Like when The Long Winters closed the show with a horn-section-and-all cover of Chicago's Feeling Stronger Every Day.

(Great photo of guest rocker Ben Gibbard on sticks after the jump.)

Photos by Michael A. Goldberg.