Still trying to process the Al Sparhawk show I saw last night at First Avenue. It was a tour de force, musically, emotionally and visually. Sparhawk was equal parts electro shaman and rock visionary: it was a punch-in-the-gut performance that was arresting, invigorating, challenging, enlightening and, ultimately, profoundly moving. It produced the kind of catharsis that only the best art can provide....something increasingly necessary in days like these.
I've watched Al perform in a variety of incarnations over the last year or so and heard (via live recordings) his new music - including many of these songs - develop in different forms: hard core electro funk with heavily processed/altered vocals, the delicious psych / funk of Derecho Rhythm Section, straight ahead rock, soul-revealing slowcore and all points in between. Recent Al live shows here in MSP and Duluth have often popped up with short notice and, other than the frequent Derecho shows, you never really knew what to expect, which adds a nice bit of tension to the new material that is exploding out of him with often ferocious urgency. His short outdoor 10pm set last summer at the Totally GNP block party - always a feast of delights - where he performed White Roses material in the middle of a packed crowd with just a microphone & blistering tracks blasting behind him while he ecstatically danced like a spirit possessed, had 4am Coachella rave tent intensity and was absolutely one of the best live performances I saw in 2024.
The 2025 version of the "Al Sparhawk Band" is comprised of Al on guitar & vocals with his son Cyrus on bass (who has played with Al at almost every live appearance over the last 2 years) plus longtime collaborator Eric Pollard on drums. The setlist has been pretty static this year:
6 opening songs from the current "controversial" White Roses album
5 songs from the forthcoming collab with Trampled by Turtles
1 song common to both of those releases, the devastating "Heaven" ("Heaven / It's a lonely place if you're alone / I wanna be there with the people that I love") delivered tonight with unprocessed vocals. "Get Still," the set opener tonight, is the other song that is on both White Roses, My God and Alan Sparhawk with Trampled By Turtles, but on this tour "Get Still" is being performed in the White Roses version.
2 Retribution Gospel Choir tunes, including the unreleased "JCMF" aka "When Jesus Comes Back" which memorably exclaims: "When Jesus comes back / All you motherf***ers are gonna pay"
2 songs that have been in every one of the two dozen or so Derecho Rhythm Section sets over the last few years, providing sonic and emotional relief in the midst of the storm (Al gave a nice s/o to Derecho mates Al Church and Izzy Cruz)
1 Low song in the encore, tonight it was "Days Like These," one of Al's finest songs in recent years, with lyrics that hit home like a sledgehammer:
"When you think you've seen everything
You'll find we're living in days like these
No, you're never gonna feel complete
No, you're never gonna be released
Maybe never even see, believe
That's why we're living in days like these again"
(always a good time to revisit this video)
The emotional gravity of the songs Sparhawk has written the last few years is evident to anyone who is even slightly aware of recent events in Sparhawk's life. Witnessing them in person takes that impact to another level.
After 80 minutes of testifying - wordlessly whirling around a dark stage with punishingly loud electro jams pulsing through the new, world class First Avenue sound system, unleashing Crazy Horse-ish walls of sound, or baring his soul to the cosmos - Al thanked the crowd, told them he loved them and then read this David Lynch quote to introduce the final song of the main set, a so far unreleased, hymn-like little ditty titled, appropriately, No More Darkness.
“Don’t fight the darkness.
Don’t even worry about the darkness.
Turn on the light and the darkness goes.
Turn up that light of pure consciousness: Negativity goes.”
SETLIST
Alan Sparhawk
April 10, 2025
First Ave - Minneapolis, MN
01 Get Still
02 I Made This Beat
03 Can U Hear
04 Station
05 Brother
06 Project 4 Ever
07 Heaven
08 Screaming Song
09 JCMF (aka When Jesus Comes Back)
10 Torn & In Ashes
11 Get High
12 Poor Man's Daughter
13 Too High
14 Liquid Love (Roy Ayer's cover)
15 Stranger
16 Not Broken
17 No More Darkness
Encore
18 Days Like These
- 1-7: Alan Sparhawk - White Roses, My God (2024)
- 1,7,8,10,13,15,16: Alan Sparhawk - Alan Sparhawk with Trampled By Turtles (2025)
- 9: unreleased (previously performed by Retribution Gospel Choir & Al Sparhawk 2013-2025)
- 11: Derecho Rhythm Section (released on Bandcamp in 2023 & performed live 2023-2025)
- 12: Retribution Gospel Choir - 2 (2010)
- 14: Derecho Rhythm Section (performed live 2023-2025)
- 17: unreleased (first performed in 2025)
- 18: Low - HEY WHAT (2021)
Al Sparhawk: vocals, guitar (7-18)
Cyrus Sparhawk: bass, vocals
Eric Pollard: drums, vocals
Additional backing tracks used on 1-6
In related news....
The Alan Sparhawk and Trampled By Turtles album is supposed to come out on May 30, 2025, but cassette copies of it were being sold at the merch table, 7+ weeks before the official release date. Side A was the Sparhawk/TBT album with all of White Roses, My God on side B.
Nice guerrilla marketing!
