TRAFFIC: Coming or Going

“Turn off those fuckin’ lights!” the Phantom of the Balcony bellowed. And on that disrespectful note the show began. We were not aware that we were to witness either the sad end of an era, or the shaky first steps to a great change. Judging from the performance that followed we weren’t the only ones caught unawares. Traffic was definitely not all there and the hollowness was chilling.

Winwood sauntered meekly to center stage to a tumultuous welcome. Chicago can be the most demonstratively grateful audience in the universe when welcoming a returning legend, just as it can be the, most devastating^ rude bunch of fuckers this side of Armaggeddon tO| new faces or unproven ideas. . This night they were faced with all of the above and responded with appropriate variety going from ecstacy to cat calls whenever the mood struck them. Between moods they sat in a wine soaked stupor waiting for encore time. That’s the fun part. The show is just something to watch before you set fire to the chairs and hurl cherrybombs onto the unsuspecting bodies below. And if that doesn’t bring them back you can always light a roll of toilet paper and send it blazing across the auditorium. Brings to mind the old time cowboy bad guy yelling “Dance!” at his quaking victim while firing a round of bullets at his feet. Rock stars are finally at the mercy of the arrogance they taught us. Unfortunately some of the least arrogant and most sensitive musicians are also at the mercy of the knuckleheads. And Winwood is definitely one of the last living examples of that sort of cat. I just know this dude got an incomplete in Rock Star Attitudes 101. He came out wearing this lived-in looking t-shirt that didn’t fit ground the waist, and a pair of those hew looking jeans that bend like cardboard. His hair had been rudely chopped off just at chinline and looked slightly unwashed. And very neglected. It spilled into his still bright and painfully open eyes whenever he huddled over those keyboards.