I felt the same as you do, having seen Sonic Youth 10 times since 1995 (and never since 2005). Then i checked the facts, going to your concert chronology in order to count the number of times i've heard each song.

Seen 4 times : Bull In The heather, Schizophrenia, Teenage Riot, Sunday and Kool Thing
Seen 3 times : Expressway, White Kross, Eric's Trip, Shadow Of A Doubt and most of ATL.

I'd have said i'd seen Tom Violence numerous times but as a matter of fact it only happened once. Guess it blew my mind so completely as a show opener that i remember it very accuraterly. On the contrary, Kool Thing, i wouldn't have said i'd seen it so often.

So yeah, i'm with you here, DV69, White Kross, Shadow Of A doubt, She is Not Alone, Tom Violence, Expressway, as great as they are, wouldn't stand out as big surprises.
A song they haven't played in the past 15 years, like Green Light or Stereo Sanctity, THAT would be awesome (and they will have time to rehearse before their show in Paris in october)

Inhuman, in Paris 2002... That was a great surprise for us! :-)

Is anybody going to post the Richmond setlist? Did I miss it somewhere or is it the fact that it's a weekday and it'll go up when attendees get home from work today?

I went to the show, do not remember the exact order, but they did bust
out "Incinerate", "Jams Run Free" and "Pink Steam" in addition to everything
off Eternal except "Thunderclap" as well as "Sprawl", "Cross the Breeze"
and "DV69".

still going
 

I head that show hasn't ended yet. They started The Diamond Sea at 1am last night with the promise to keep playing as long as the audience lasted.

Wow, that's pretty weird that they suddenly went back to playing Rather Ripped material. I wonder why? Of course, I could hear Pink Steam a million times and still love it.

just to be clear, that's the richmond setlist. seems like they got amnesia . . . all but three songs are from the eternal or RR. would have loved to have seen catholic block or tom violence. but hell, i'm not exactly complaining . . . i mean, they played the sprawl and 'cross the breeze for god's sake (though they cut out my favorite part of the sprawl). and death valley '69 (!!).

I really hope they don't play RR stuff when I see them.

Same. I've seen them twice. Once during the RR tour where they played the whole album as well as during one of the DDN shows where they encored with 5 RR songs. Either way I'm sure it'll be great to see them again, but I'd rather just hear all the songs off The Eternal and 4-6 oldies instead. The only song I wouldn't really mind hearing from RR would be Pink Steam. If they're going to play stuff from other 00s albums I'd wish they'd dust off some Murray Street songs.

I would have been excited with that setlist, but I only got to see one Rather Ripped show and it was on an off night for the band.

They very likely played RR stuff because they didn't tour VA in '06.

wow, i'm gonna keep my mouth shut if THAT's what happens when i start talkin' set list design...

Jeezpers ! I'm an SY fan that loves RR but I'd prefer none played in Nashville Saturday. Each of the last 3 times I've seen them RR has featured prominently.

I'm confident they'll pull out something they haven't played in awhile. So, all of The Eternal then ~5 disparate items !

You know, I was thinking that the tunes were being picked with previous tour schedules in mind. It's a great way to spread the love around. Kudos to them!

i'm in a way a little surprised they would put that much thought into the setlists.

i know for a fact they do.



unless i'm remembering wrong. that happens.

I hear ya. Pink Steam is a classic and I have no problem hearing that gem, anything else though I could do without (at least on this tour, playing them again in the future is fine with me).

I'd kill for some Murray Street! Hearing Karenology/Karen Revis. live was one of my all-time favourite live music experiences.

My favorite two which I would kill to hear off Murray Street would be Sympathy and Rain On Tin. It pisses me off I had to discover SY in '05 and then get to see them for the first time in '06 when they totally stopped playing those songs.

Being a fan of 6 years, and having had the opportunity to see them but twice, on album tours, because they would never play any sort of non-album shows in Canada... I don't think it's really necessarily to play an almost exclusively new material set at a time like their one and only Canadian show for three years, you get me? Even with the "we don't want to become dinosaurs" argument, it doesn't add up to me, personally, play for another half our, you could throw in a bunch of classics and do the whole new album if you want.

Don't interpret this like I hated the show I saw, I just mean, it would be nice to be able to see a show like that, and then maybe a year down the line, another in this neck of the woods that would consist of a more evenly spread setlist.