Jenny Lewis LIVE

Imagine my surprise when on holiday in New Orleans and a random detour, which was really out of the way for my hotel, leads us to the House Of Blues. “Ooh, I wonder what sort of gigs they’ve got on” was the cry and a quick look at the board resulted in a double take. Jenny Lewis? Tonight? We’re having some of that. Of course I could swear that I’d checked every New Orleans venue prior to the holiday and seen that no-one of any interest was on. Indeed I even knew that the delectable Miss Lewis was in the middle of an American tour and I’d bemoaned the fact that her itinerary missed anywhere I was. But hey. Maybe there is such a thing as fate after all. Either that or some form of reverse stalking is in effect.

Anyway, it was exciting to be going to a concert in foreign climes, even if my mate’s excited pronouncement that “for once both of us will be able to get schvizted at a concert” proved to be false. Because those peculiar American’s (w ho had two nights earlier asked for no ID as I drank the night away with a bunch of strippers) wouldn’t give my mate a wrist band to prove to the bar-staff that he was old enough to drink as he didn’t have any official identification. Bear in mind that the previous trip to the Strip Club had been to celebrate his THIRTIETH birthday. Still, I could drink, that was the main thing. Even if, when you think about it, I couldn’t even hand him my mate my drink when I went to the toilets lest he get arrested on the spot for impersonating an adult.

The support was the Heartless Bastards, who weren’t bad but in all honesty were neither here nor there. As for Jenny Lewis, well any regular reader of this page, or indeed anyone who has ever took the time to read this page even once, will know that I love her. So naturally I am biased. But this was REALLY good. In fact I would go as far as to say that this was the best form that I’ve seen her in. And I don’t say that just because she was wearing tight shorts. Maybe I’m just imagining it, but there was just something about it all that seemed, well, right. In a way that Jenny Lewis on a cold and wet night in Manchester just seems to have that little something missing when compared to Jenny Lewis on a sweltering and balmy New Orleans night. Quite why she chose to sing a little snippet of “Man In The Mirror” as her tribute to the recently dead Michael Jackson in the encore though is beyond me. Still, I could forgive Jenny Lewis almost anything.