While I prefer my summer concerts to be outdoors, I kicked off my 2023 summer concert series with my wife at an indoor show at City Winery in Chicago where I recently saw some of XTC perform as EXTC. The great thing about venturing out in Chicago to do anything is that there are never any Fox News viewers out & about in Chicago. One of the great cities of the world is just a bit too scary for them. My message to Fox News viewers is to listen to Steve Perry of Journey and “Don’t stop believing” that nonsense. We really don’t miss having you around.
We had just seen Michael McDermott around Halloween last year do his annual Halloweensteen show where he pays tribute to Bruce Springsteen. It was a great show, and it was free, courtesy of local radio station WXRT, which made the show even greater. But I had never seen McDermott perform his own music. In fact, outside of absolutely loving one of his songs and having heard a few others, I was somewhat unfamiliar with his catalog. So, it was with some trepidation that I bought tickets to see McDermott perform his album Gethsemane on the 30th anniversary of its release.
Well, the gamble paid off. First, his Gethsemane album is a gem from beginning to end. No wonder he was being hailed as the next Dylan. You can listen to the whole album here.
But there have been big changes in McDermott in the 30 years since Gethsemane was released.
No, he’s not bald, not that there’s anything wrong with that. He still has lots of hair as you can see.
Show off. The big change is that his voice is not as smooth as on the album. It’s a bit gravelly now, and it works to his advantage.
Oh, and he’s no longer an alcoholic drug addict as Heather Horton, his wife and violinist in the band, called him when she opened the show with some of her own solo music. That alcohol/drug thing has kept a lot of folks from sustaining greatness as it did for McDermott back in the 90s.
But he seems quite comfortable now, many years sober, married, and a parent. During the concert, he paid homage to recently-deceased WXRT deejay and Chicago icon Lin Brehmer as Brehmer’s widow was in attendance at the show last night. McDermott was a WXRT favorite back in the 90s before his career went off the rails, and McDermott paid it back a bit by surprising Brehmer three years ago in the studio as Brehmer ended his long-running morning show before heading to the midday shift. The first song is politically-charged and quite appropriate for that time in early 2020. The second is one of McDermott’s early songs and a fan fave.
Lin Brehmer always said, “It’s great to be alive.” It was last night at City Winery.
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