Placing musicians in unconventional venues is one of the neater things that CityArts Fest does with their programming; so I'm not entirely sure what I expected from Ryan Adams's show in the warm stately embrace of Benaroya Hall. It didn't seem like the sort of place that I'd imagine finding a musician that I started listening to in a turn of the century phase of musical/cultural vampirism sometime after Whiskeytown and sort of faded away before he picked up the Cardinals (Spotify has since caught me up with his latest, Ashes & Fire). During that time, he was making records like Heartbreaker and Gold and while I never managed to catch one of his shows I imagined them as more appropriate for a dirty bar than for a pristine symphonic setting whose aisles were constantly patrolled by ushers.

So I guess I may have imagined some old time volatility, but definitely not a comedy show. Still, that's pretty much exactly what those of us lucky enough to finagle our ways into the sold-out show got: the "Gallhager of Alternative Country", amiably chiding late arrivals in the third row, expressing befuddlement at the screams of a woman who sounded more like a murder victim than delighted fan, and taking the incessant shouts of the Loudest Man in Seattle in winning stride. Maybe it helped that all of the crowd's comments were swallowed up by the room's acoustics, making it sound allegedly like a Spiritualized record or something unintelligibly reverby that would nevertheless garner a 9.2 at Pitchfork?

The musical part of the performance was pared down to a minimalist exercise. Barely amplified, Adams bounded onto the symphony's stage for two shaggy haired hours accompanied only by a customized pumpkin, an upright piano, two guitars, a harmonica, and an overstuffed songbook. (Turns out that he's one of those rare singer-songwriter who's good at singing and songwriting!). Aside from the few aforementioned guests whose discomfort with silence at public performances, most everyone else in the inside of that great "Jawa Machine" (look out, robots!) of a concert hall alternated between flurried claps of recognition, rapt silent attention, and cheers of appreciation, and laughter at all of the between- and, occasionally, within-song jokes from the knit-scarf worthy wild ride that began with "Oh My Sweet Carolina" and concluded, after much prodding, with an encore closing "Come Pick Me Up."

Sprinkled through the actual setlist was a hilarious (probably only to those who were there) digression imagining the Loudest Man In Seattle as a collector of Tron TrapperKeepers and soccer stickers, an amazing falsetto transformation of Psychic Cheetah, a death metal take on Strawberry Wine, and a quick-witted rewriting of "The End" that cast the song's waitress as a werewolf robot from the future. As the clock ticked closer to the union-approved curfew I began to wonder whether the ravenous fans would turn the evening into #occupybenaroya, refusing to leave until Adams had played every person's own personal favorite song from his extensive catalog.

Instead, despite their minor squabbles, he made up with the L.M.I.S., imagining their bagel dates to discuss KISS lisp conspiracies, and closed the already stunning evening with a gorgeous rendition of "Come Pick Me Up." Howls in support of songs about existential love never seemed more warranted.

A little bit about Allen Stone, with some photos, after the jump.

Walking back up the hill I stopped at Neumo's to see Allen Stone filling for an eleventh hour Fences cancellation. It was his third performance in as many nights for CityArts Fest, having already headlined the opening night VIP party at Union Station on Wednesday and played his regularly scheduled gig at the Triple Door on Thursday. The nature of the festival, allowing people to quickly reshape their agendas, meant that the appropriate crowd found the right band at the right time, with Stone, a singer that's gained praise for not being afraid to get ugly, holding court in a sweaty humid room. If anyone in the showroom was disappointed by the absence of confessional indie rock, it certainly wasn't obvious in the hothouse glow of the Sailor Jerry's promotional neon or among the young drinking masses, dressed for a soul night, happily being sorted into dance-off teams.