Gordon Lightfoot Forums - Mahnomen, MN Set List

Hello all- Whenever Gord is within reasonable driving range of Minnesota, we always try to go. This time, I have tickets for all three MN concerts this weekend, but only tonight in Minneapolis will my wife go. It's our wedding anniversary, so we will make it a date night in downtown Minneapolis.

It's about a four-five hour drive to Mahnomen. It is one of the most out of the way places Gord will likely appear. The town is about 1,000 people; it sits on the White Earth Indian Reservation in northwestern Minnesota. The Shooting Star Casino was the site.

I don't gamble, so I am always a bit perplexed by 50 to 80 year old people pumping their social security and pension money into a machine that is rigged to lose. What I really don't get are the people with oxygen tanks beside them, sitting in a smoke-filled room. God, I hate cigarette smoke. But I digress and each to his own.

The concert was sold out and packed. The "auditorium" was one of those multi-purpose rooms. And I would guess there was 1,200-1,500 in the crowd. The seats were miserably ganged together. For $45, I deserved a better fate and sightllines. The crowd was full of drunks and was rowdy in character.

On the positive side, whatever they did to the soundmix last night really worked. My main complaint about Gord concerts is that Gord's voice gets buried into the instruments. Well, last night, it was a true folk concert with Gord's voice carrying the load and the instruments supporting, rather than supplanting the sound. Gord was typically a tad hoarse at the beginning but really warmed up and to me, was just as good as he has been since he came back touring in 2005 after his nearly-fatal illness.

Here's the set list, casino show with no intermission:

1) Sweet Guinevere
2) Cotton Jenney
3) 14 Karat Gold
4) Never Too Close
5) A Painter Passing Through
6) In My Fashion
7) Rainy Day People
8) Shadows
9) Beautiful
10) Carefree Highway
11) Hangdog Hotel Room
12) Ribbon of Darkness
13) Sundown
14) Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
15) Alberta Bound
16) Don Quixote
17) Clouds of Loneliness
18) Let It Ride
19) If You Could Read My Mind
20) Baby Step Back
21) Restless
22) Early Morning Rain
23) Encore: Blackberry Wine

Gord was pleasant, but very business-like, keeping the show going for a 90-minute limit. He told the joke about the rabbit hair. He did a new one that was, "What does a three-headed English monster say?" I could not hear the punchline. Does anyone know the punchline of this one? All I could hear was Gord doing a British accent.

Carter Lancaster: Yes, it was strange without Terry Clements. Carter has his own style. It is me, or did he does he look like a young Red Shea up there? I think Carter is a very capable lead guitarist. The only thing I did miss is that he played more subdued instrumentals during "Baby Step Back" than Terry did.

So I was happy with the set list in Mahnomen. It hopefully means that we might get the "Canadian Railroad Trilogy" tonight in Minneapolis. Yes! If he does at least 2 of the three from my wife's favorites, "Song for a Winter's Night", "Fine as Fine Can Be", or "If Children Had Wings"... that will be perfect.

So that's it for now. We'll be going into Minneapolis shortly. I'll post the Minneapolis set list Sunday afternoon, before I go off to Duluth to catch the 8:00 p.m. show on the shores of Gitchee Gumee.

John