Live review (sort of): Ani DiFranco @ United Palace Theatre

I can’t think of the last time a song made me cry, and, for the record, I did not cry at the first four Ani DiFranco shows I attended. Two years ago I was driving home from Lansing, listening to Ani’s live Carnegie Hall album, when I heard the song “Angry Anymore” for the first time. I had to play it a few times on repeat because I couldn’t comprehend that she was actually telling my story. I know a lot of people who can say that about her songs, the generic fuck-patriarchy this and fuck-Bush that, which I also can relate to. This song doesn’t fall into those categories, and it was (and still is) scary to me how I can explain how each verse fits in to my family/life, because it’s a story that’s so specific to me. And I know that my interpretation of it probably isn’t how she intended it, but the song still means a lot to me.

However, it’s not a song she plays often live, so when I recognized the chord progression at the beginning of it just a few songs into her show tonight, I was so caught off-guard that I couldn’t help but start crying. And that, along with her playing “Subdivision” right before (another favorite song I hadn’t heard live), made it totally worth the $50 + service charges I spent on my ticket.

Aside from that, the show was still great, despite my crappy seats (although I did move up a few rows), but hey, you can’t win ‘em all. Plus, today I bought tickets to see her at the Royal Oak Music Theater in October, which is general admission and a fairly small venue.

A couple of interesting things I noticed … she played four tracks from her upcoming Red Letter Year, but didn’t mention anything about the album, and she didn’t play a single song from her most recent album (not counting last year’s retrospective collection album Canon), Reprieve, and only one track from 2005′s Knuckle Down.

As with any show by an artist who has 20 albums (yep, the new one is her 20th), it’s impossible to hit everyone’s favorite song in every set, so there’s always stuff I’m surprised/sad got left out, but that’s why I keep going to see her.

Ani’s setlist:

“Anticipate”
“Present/Infant”
“Subdivision”
“Angry Anymore”
“Red Letter Year”
“Napoleon”
“Raincheck”
“Welcome To:”
“Sunday Morning”
“Animal”
“Garden of Simple”
“Imagine That”
“The Atom”
“Alla This”
“As Is”
“Shameless”

Encore:
“Evolve”
“Everest”
“32 Flavors”