Paul starts out with a classic Gibson Les Paul Jr, single cutaway, and a single P-90 pickup. Hard to judge the vintage-ness of this one, they were produced from the 50’s through the 70’s, with a reissue in the past few years. My guess is this is not a reissue.

For I Don’t Know, he then breaks out a newer Gibson ES-355 with a hardtail bridge. I believe these were made in the past 15 years, and may be his favorite ‘brown guitar’ that he has talked about in interviews. It might also be the one Johnny Rzeznik of the Goo Goo Dolls gave him at one point.

The next switch is for Merry Go Round, which brings out a ‘modified’ First Act ME-501. This is most likely the guitar purchased at Wal-Mart on the 2005 tour that lead to the Paul Westerberg signature model.

Up next is a Gibson SG Junior, with a hardtail bridge and a single P-90 pickup. Judging from the shape of the pickguard, this is an early 70’s guitar. (Compared to the beautiful early 60’s one he smashed at the Pantages in 2004, but I should let that go.)

After this, it’s a return to the brown ES-335 for the rest of the night.

The amps are a little trickier. There were more stacks than players on stage, so this is just a guess. To the left of the drum riser is a Soldano tube head on a Marshall 4×12, to the right a Fender brownface combo on top of another Marshall 4×12. No idea if these are both also on, or only for specific guitars.

And for Tommy Stinson, he played his ESP signature model up until the encore when he switched out for an old Ampeg Dan Armstrong plexiglass. He had 3 Ampeg stacks on stage, 2 behind him, and one behind Dave Minehan.

Speaking of Mr Minehan, he appeared to play the same black 70’s Gibson Les Paul Custom all night through a Hiwatt stack, and what appears to be a Matchless head also stacked on there. Josh Freese played some drums. They had the letters DW on them. I am an ignorant guitar player when it comes to drums, sorry.

(No really. The kids wanted it. Honest.)

Of course, one of the selling points for me was the inclusion of the Replacements’ Alex Chilton. But the Rock Band series also seemed less Heavy Metal loaded, and includes everything from Dinosaur Jr to Elvis Costello to The Talking Heads. So, like most guitar players out there, I really wanted to play drums. Without the whole divorce-trap, space-taking, loud-as-hell deal that a real drum kit would present.

So we started our family band, with me on drums, and my daughters on vox and guitar. They picked out the name Pickles (I wanted something with more majesty. Oh well.) and we started our tour. Pickles is doing well so far, we have branched to clubs outside of Boston now, and we stick to mainly playing on medium just to reduce the failure rate.

So I have spent a lot of free time practicing. (Please don’t tell my real band. They think I’m learning our new songs, I’ll just have to fake it in a Paul Stanley sorta way next gig.) I managed to get pretty good at most of the songs on medium. Including Alex Chilton.

So I thought, ‘I know this song inside and out, no reason I can’t master it.’ and tried it on Hard. The best I can say is that I didn’t fail. But the incessant hi-hat and bass drum about killed me. It was much harder than I could imagine. At least much harder than the ‘boom, click’ Westerberg described as he chuckled in his interview for Rock Band.

Then I saw this video on YouTube of some kid nailing 100% on Expert.

After my jealousy died down a bit, I thought about how cool that is. And the dozens of other videos showing kids trying to master that song. I know it’s just a silly video game, and pushing buttons doesn’t equate making music, but the idea of childrens by the millions beating out Alex Chilton in their living rooms makes me smile. I feel that’s the saving grace of a game like this. Exposing people to music they might otherwise never hear. I can’t tell you how tickled I am when my ten year-old daughter starts singing Elvis Costello’s Pump It Up to herself while doing homework.

If it’s on daddy’s iPod, it’s old and smelly. But if it’s in Rock Band, it’s cool. I’ll take it any way I can.

Don’t need to remember the words, just get the key phrases out there.

And let Bob rip.

But Motorhead? Surely they were too metal for the punk scene. But Lemmy was punk before they had a genre for it. And Ace Of Spades is the perfect song to attempt to sonically flatten a Duluth roller rink.

Walsh wasn’t so much a host or an emcee for the event, but rather a cheerleader (and sometimes playful pest) for his friends, the bands, and the audience. I would imagine he is taking it easy today after a long night of smiling, singing, shouting, drinking, hugging, signing, and hip-checking guitarists. He also gets points for playing a out-of-the-blue cover of Bittersweet Symphony.

The bands were exceptional from top to bottom. No matter if they were attempting spot-on covers, or spinning their own version of Mats’ classics (and some not so classic)

Here’s a general rundown of the music, as far as I can remember. (this tall boy had his fill of $3.75 PBR Tall Boys. memory gaps are inevitable)

From the mainroom:

The Evening Rig – Solid band that did a pretty straight-up job of playing Valentine, Waitress In the Sky, and Kiss Me On the Bus

The Alarmists – Damn good band. did a damn fine job on Left Of the Dial, Swinging Party, The Ledge, and I Will Dare. (for the record, the singer sang “bacon and cigarettes’. But he is like 20 years old, so what does he know)

Revolver Modele – Industrial/Goth rock versions of Johnny’s Gonna Die, Color Me Impressed, and Unsatisfied. If you’re gonna cover Unsatisfied, rockin’ the pulsing goth/dance beat is the way to go.

One For The Team – they looked a bit hippie-ish, but rocked solid. I’ll Be You, Nevermind, Beer For Breakfast, and Can’t Hardly Wait along with a horn section. Very sweet.

Honeydogs – Just a flat out awesome rock band. Totally underrated. Answering Machine, Sixteen Blue, Darlin’ One, and a great Kids Don’t Follow.

Birthday Suits – Great high-energy guitar/drums two piece band. Slugged out Fuck School, Stuck In The Middle, and Goddamn Job in record time.

From the Entry:

At times it was tough getting into the Entry. Packed to the gills. The vibe in the Entry was very hootenanny-ish. Terry Walsh, Martin Devaney, and friends made a joyful mess of a sound for most of the night. A ‘spirited’ Date To Church was of note.

Also of note from the Entry was Brian Vanderwerf of Chooglin’ covering an unreleased Replacements outtake, Don’t Get Married with a band including two acoustic guitars, banjo, glockenspiel, trombone, and tuba. Probably was my favorite song of the night.

If this is how book release parties go down, I’ve been missing all the literary fun. And that’s pretty much what this night was, fun. What else do you need on a Wednesday night? Let’s do this again, soon.

Chris Riemenschneider’s take on the evening from the Star Tribune.

In honor of this day of manic consumerism, I wish I had a Mats cover of Steely Dan’s Black Friday. But they never seemed to veer towards Fagen/Brecker songs.

So instead I will just post another Stones cover. Here’s Heart Of Stone from the Uptown Bar in 1985.

This year, I’m thankful for the normal stuff. You know, family, friends, solvency, nutty bars, beer….. but this year I’m gonna add cowbell to the list.

And Honky Tonk Women. (Pittsburg, PA 1987)