I've discovered 3 more unreleased songs last night. It's amazing how these songs pop up out of nowhere. Two of them didn't have titles and are fairly recent, and the other has a title and was recorded over 2 years ago.
The Words (followed by Industry) - this is the oldest unreleased track I found. It would have probably ended up on OK Now. Performed at the UGA on April 2008.
A performance of 'Throw My Love Around has finally surfaced on Youtube. It's a song that Jon rarely played since his 'OK Now' release or hasn't played at all to my knowledge:
Throw My Love Around (with Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers)
Here's an early live version of BMH, performed in 2007 when Jon opened for Kelly Clarkson.
Thanks to Homertilicus for sharing the link. As he pointed out, this version has a piano solo instead of a bridge before the last chorus. Obvious change being that a bridge was added and the piano solo was removed in the final cut of the studio version.
Here are three new songs that have been captured on video for the past couple of months during Jon's concerts. Hopefully this is a sign of a new album coming soon (perhaps at the end of this year or early next year!?)
Additionally, here is a brief review from our friend Homertilicus, who attended the Jon concert at the SOMA in San Diego, CA on the 27th of February. ----------------------------------------- The concert ended fairly early. Doors were at 7:00pm. The opening act, Blue In The Face, took the stage at like 7:30pm. Jon came out at about 8:30pm. He played until 10:25ish and the show was over.
After the opening act finished, Jon's band started setting up. The stage didn't have a curtain, so we could see all the stagehands and band members setting up their equipment. I saw Dylan and Bobby come out and test their guitars. There was a stagehand testing Jon's keyboard and mic. And I guess the sound level was waaay too low since Dylan had to recheck it and retest it a few times until we finally heard sound from it. They set up for a while, then they disappeared backstage.
With no curtain to block their entrance, the band members finally took the stage and picked up their instruments. Jon just came right out with them. He didn't make a later entrance or anything grand. He just walked out on stage with everyone in the dimly lit stage and put up his hand to greet the crowd. There was only about 100 people there, maybe less. The venue was small and it wasn't even filled. I think it's because Soma is a punk rock/hardcore venue - so no one knew Jon was playing there. There wasn't a marquee or anything outside that had Jon's name or anything.
Jon opened the show with "Always On My Mind" playing guitar and then moved into "Beating My Heart". The setlist was, and I don't remember the exact order: "Always On My Mind", "Beating My Heart", "Perfect", "You Are The One I Love", "Human", "Amelia's Missing" (with extended instrumental break, yay!) "Indiana", "Why I'm Talking to You", "Come Together" (Beatles cover), "You Can Never Go Back", "Piano Man" (Billy Joel cover), "Mary Jane's Last Dance" (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers cover), "Indiana" and "Four Years". The encore was "Mary Jane" and "Four Years". Oh and he played a new song, which he says is untitled, but it's pretty clear that it's called "You Belong With Me" since that's the main part of the chorus and keeps getting repeated. It's an uptempo piano rock song. The music is reminscent of U2's "Beautiful Day".
He said that when he's having fun on stage, he likes to sing songs that aren't his, but songs that most people will know. He said he sings enough songs that no one knows - his songs. When he sang "Mary Jane", he dedicated it to a girl in the audience who said it was her birthday and he even said happy birthday to her after the song. And he dedicated it to his former college dormmate who was in the audience but didn't raise his hand to be recognized. Jon said his roommate was always playing that song in college, so he sings it now.
After the show ended, the crowd dispersed really quickly. There were a lot of people hanging out in the lobby waiting for Jon to come out, but they quickly left after like 10 minutes. Then the security kicked everyone out, so we waited outside the front entrance. Then the security locked the front doors and told people that Jon wasn't coming out and that we should all leave. A lot of people left, but a group of girls circled around the back of the building. I followed them with my friend. We waited around by the backstage exit for Jon. And another group of girls waited by his tour bus. After waiting for a little while, I noticed that the girls by the tour bus were taking pictures. I didn't know if Jon was there cuz I couldn't see him and I thought that maybe the girls were just taking pictures by the bus. Turns out, Jon was on the bus and he came out to take pictures with everyone and sign whatever they had.
So the group I was with by the backstage exit made our way over to Jon. I got a picture with him, he signed my CDs and laughed when he saw I had his self-titled indie album. He was like, "whaaaat? I don't even own this one anymore...." and he smiled. I shook his hand this time and thanked him. Even though I've met him once before, I was still super nervous. I wanted to take a separate picture with just me and him, but there was a group of girls still waiting and Jon was cold. He was still wearing the same thin little T-shirt he had on stage and he was like, "geez, why's it so cold here tonight" when he was signing my CDs. Ironic, right? Since he just said on stage that San Diego has fantastic weather. Poor guy. It was like 50 degrees, but he was sweating on stage and I think his shirt was still a little wet so that made him colder. Still, he stayed out there and greeted everyone and signed stuff for everyone. There must have been like 20 people all together. He's a trooper and was super nice.
Jon's voice was on point at this show. He sounded absolutely fantastic on every song and never hit a bum note. I love that even with a small turnout, he still gave a passionate, energetic performance. The upside to the venue was that the sound was fantastic. When I saw him in LA at the El Rey Theatre, I stood too close to the stage and missed the "sweet spot" of the sound system. So it was hard to hear him clearly since the sound system was positioned to be best heard by the center of the room. At Soma, I was in the sweet spot and close to the stage. The bass was thumping so hard you could feel it and everything was clear. Loved it!
**Please do not take his pics and claim them as your own. You can ask him in the shout box if you want to post them anywhere else (if he doesn't mind).** ----------------------------------------- Thanks for the review bud!
Just thought I'd post a bit about my second Jon McL experience.
Date: January 31, 2009
Where: Blender Theater at the Gramercy in New York City, NY
This was my second time seeing Jon perform live and it was a pretty good show. I say 'pretty good' because a couple of unfortunate things happened: 1) Jon got sick in Boston [the concert before this show], so his voice was a little groggy but he did his best to put on a great show and 2) the fire alarm at the venue went off 4 times while he was performing (3 times during his performance and once before he went on)
Here was his setlist to the best of my ability (not all songs are in order):
Industry, Beating My Heart, Always On My Mind (interrupted), You Are the One I Love, Amelia's Missing, Perfect, Beautiful Disaster, Why I'm Talking to You, Human, Come Together (Beatles cover-- interrupted), Four Years (interrupted) and Indiana.
A few songs were performed differently. You are the One I Love and Amelia's Missing lasted a little longer their album versions and Beautiful Disaster was completely revised, it sounded nothing like the album version, but it was great to hear an updated version of the song.
I recorded his performance of 'You Are the One I Love'. It's a really great version live, the video doesn't do the song justice. Check the video out:
After the concert, I, along with few dozen people waited downstairs at the venue's bar to see if Jon would come out and greet the fans. About 40 mins. of waiting, it appeared that he would not be coming out and the staff started wrapping up to leave, so we were asked to leave. So I stood outside in the freezing weather for about 20-30 mins. At one point I almost wanted to leave but I didn't give in and waited just a bit more. In my mind, I kept thinking this was probably going to be the last time I would ever get the chance to actually meet Jon after a show.
Eventually his band members started to come out one by one, including his wife Amy. Then finally JON came out! I called out his name and walked over to him. I was really nervous and freaking cold I could barely talk and it didn't make me introduce myself properly so I quickly asked him if he could sign his albums for me (Up Until Now, self-titled, Songs I Wrote and Later Recorded, Indiana, and OK NOW), which he did! I thanked him so much for it and probably shook his hand three times. We only talked for a couple of minutes and as we were approaching his touring van, a group of people were waiting there hoping to meet him, so I thanked him once again, told him to take care and left so the other people can have some time with him. =)
He is such a sweet, down-to-earth person, I hope that never changes. I left a very happy person that night... I'll never forget it. =)
As Jon prepares to start his 2009 tour, I've decided to make this post a dedication to his previous tour. Here are various live performance clips of his songs from OK Now in 2008.
Here are two videos of Jon. The first one is his appearance and performance on the Today Show in 2007. The second one is an interview at the MSG Studio in NY, also from 2007.
Here is a video of Jon performing live in-studio at 106.7 KFRX in Lincoln, NE on October 30, 2008. A few lucky fans were invited to this one-of-a-kind private concert.
Setlist (acoustic): Beautiful Disaster Beating My Heart Human Beating My Heart (in-studio at KFRX)
Click on the links to view the video or listen to audio. To Save: right click on the link and save as.
