On a warm and sunny Saturday, moe.rons from all across New England gathered in Northampton, MA for moe.’s spring tour closer at the Calvin Theatre. Many .rons traveled down from Burlington, VT, fresh off an impressive 2-night run at Higher Ground from the recently rejuvenated band. If fans were to expect anything after last year’s fiery winter tour closer at the Calvin, they were in for a good time.
The first set took off quickly as Rob Derhak broke into the first words of fan favorite “Captain America,” which was met with a huge cheer from the crowd. The song set a very upbeat mood for the beginning of first set, and was a strong song to open with in the band’s return to the Calvin. The band got to jamming swiftly, seemingly very well practiced from the previous 2 nights in Burlington, and very smoothly transitioned into “ATL,” which really showcased Al Schnier and Vinnie Amico’s ability to work as a unit. During “ATL” it was very apparent that the band was having lots of fun and ready to have tons more. After a very energetic ending of “ATL,” the band took a break filled with lots of banter between the whole band, mainly focused on Rob poking fun at guitarist Chuck Garvey’s crowd work skills. The group broke into one of percussionist Jim Loughlin’s originals, “Chromatic Nightmare,” which is an extremely impressive showcase of the musicianship in the band. Chuck took the helm towards the end of the song with a crushing solo before the band did a “no huddle” transition into “Annihilation Blues.” This version of “Annihilation Blues” was pretty standard, and helped bring up the mood after the weird jazziness of “Chromatic Nightmare.” After a rather quick jam section, the band brought the song into “Seat of my Pants,” one of three repeats from last year’s Calvin Theatre show. This “Seat of my Pants” featured the first big peak of the night, led by Al Schnier, who was in full rockstar mode. Any moe.rons who attended last year’s Calvin show will remember Al soloing right on the edge of stage and using a guy’s head as a guitar slide, which Al paid homage to by performing another killer solo on the edge of the stage, sans guitar head-slide. The band brought the jam into one more verse and chorus before ending the segment.
To close out the set, the band presented the first big highlight of the night, “Montego” > “Kyle’s Song” > “head.” “Montego”’s Latin sound switched the mood up after the very upbeat and reggae-esque “Seat of My Pants,” and featured a very trippy jam led by Loughlin and Schnier. The band transitioned into the slow, but warm, “Kyle’s Song,” kicking it off with Derhak playing the very recognizable intro bass riff. The whole crowd was singing along and participating in the usual clapping, even joined by Schnier for most sections. Lighting Director Preston Hoffman was flexing his lighting muscles during this “Kyle’s Song,” putting on one of the more impressive lighting performances of the show. Chuck Garvey took the helm of this jam, taking a lengthy but impressive solo tensely leading the whole band into one last chorus, before they started energetically building into “head.” The jam into “head.” featured a big Rob solo before starting into the main riff of the song. “head.” was met with a roar from the crowd and got everyone in the room pumped up as the band was steaming ahead like a freight train on stage. The jam featured an Al-Jim call and response section initiated by Rob, and a killer slide solo from Chuck before they ended the song.
The group opened the second set with their bluegrass tune “Queen of Everything,” which was an interesting way to start off set 2 after the high energy “head.” first set closer. After an energetic ending, the band “no huddle” segued into one of Garvey’s new songs, “Who You Calling Scared,” which was debuted at the State Theater in Maine this past February. “Who You Calling Scared” featured a very fun blues jam to close out the segment. The group wasted no time as they broke into one of my favorite moe. songs, “Four,” another repeat from last February’s Calvin Theater show. This version of “Four” was really solid, and the second big highlight of the show. “Four” featured a lot of .rons’ favorite moment from Saturday’s show: a great extended solo from Rob that featured some strange but cool synth bass tones. After Rob’s solo, the group brought the song into the third big peak of the night before one more chorus that had the whole theater singing along. “Four” smoothly transitioned into the rocker “Deep This Time,” the last of the repeats from last year’s show. Chuck broke out the slide again, starting a trend in his playing throughout the set. This version of “Deep This Time” was fairly standard and brought to close with no big jam section.
The band started into another one of the post-hiatus debuts, Loughlin’s soulful “I Can Never Remember.” This is one of my favorites of all the new songs they’ve debuted since their return as it really allows for a chance to let Jim’s voice shine and its slow, somber feel serves as a nice break between all the big peaks moe. sets tend to contain. Chuck took a great solo to end the song, rounding out this extremely solid version of “I Can Never Remember.” “Not Coming Down” started off the last segment of the night, bringing the mood up and featuring Rob Derhak’s slapping capabilities. The song had another big crowd sing along moment before taking a lesson from Wormwood’s track listing and transitioning into “Wormwood,” which brought the set back into the slower mood that “I Can Never Remember” was evoking. “Wormwood” is a great showcase of Chuck’s slide playing, which he was already showing off earlier in the show. After a pretty standard version of “Wormwood”, the band segued into “Puebla” > “St. Augustine,” the last big highlight of the show. “Puebla” set a mysterious mood in the theater, and the band made quick work of getting to the jam. This jam section started off slowly but heavily featured Rob and Vinnie’s impressiveness as a rhythm section, as the duo kept driving the jam faster and faster until they had built up enough tension to transition into “St. Augustine.” Schnier also played very heavily into “Puebla”’s jam section, taking his solo to shred city as the band steamed on behind him. The segue into “St. Augustine” was very energetic and made the crowd go wild. This song quickly picked up the pace from “Puebla” and served as a great second set closer, as the crowd sang along and the band had fun with a bluegrass-y jam towards the end. The band brought “St. Augustine” into one last chorus sing along with the crowd before ending the segment.
The group encored with the heavy but energetic Wormwood cut, “Crab Eyes” which was a great way to end this burner of a show. Two years in a row now, moe. has served up absolute heaters in Northampton! Seems like they should keep ending all their tours down at the Calvin Theatre, as one moe.ron put it, “Never miss a Calvin show!”
Setlist:
Set 1: Captain America > ATL, Chromatic Nightmare (nh) > Annihilation Blues > Seat of my Pants, Montego > Kyle’s Song > head.
Set 2: Queen of Everything (nh) > Who You Calling Scared, Four > Deep This Time, I Can Never Remember, Not Coming Down > Wormwood > Puebla > St. Augustine
Encore: Crab Eyes
Purchase & Listen to the show on Nugs.net.
Ripe’s unbelievably tight jams , genre-bending originality and rapidly growing fan base have helped them rack up over one million 
“Downward,” the fourth-track on the album, produced by Cory Wong of Vulfpeck, mixed by five-time GRAMMY-Winner Joe Visciano and mastered by Randy Merrill, reflects the duality of love with its catchy chorus:
Beast from the East marks the band’s fourth full length studio album. But more importantly, it also marks the band’s first release with keyboardist Chad Wright, whose arrival took the band from trio to quartet when he joined in December of 2016. While the album still showcases guitarist and vocalist Brandon Hardesty’s trademark catchy songwriting and clever lyrical poeticism, the addition of Wright rounds out the Bumpin Uglies sound. And that is this releases major win. Beast from the East showcases not only the band’s growth but also the band’s potential. And despite how Hardesty may lament that he doesn’t “write songs for the radio” in the aptly titled track “Radio”, Beast from the East is full of tunes that reveal otherwise.
Drummer Nate Searing set the pace all night with unwavering energy. Corey Feldman plucked his pint-sized Kala U Bass while Joey Calfa served up roaring solos on his electric uke, proving that great things do come in small packages. Tara Lawton and Terry Brennan’s vocals are larger than life, adding catchy and clever lyrics to the band’s memorable melodies. Add to the mix a melodica, slide whistle, vibraslap (a quirky little instrument that brings me straight back to my middle school band days), train whistle, megaphone, and banana shaker, and you have the marvelous musical machine that is 
The Disco Biscuits came out swinging, throwing down in Portland with a 65-minute M.E.M.P.H.I.S. > Voices Insane > Spaga > Pygmy Twylyte > Spaga, with M.E.M.P.H.I.S. and the first section of Spaga being the highlights of the opening segment. “M.E.M.P.H.I.S.” got the crowd warmed up quickly as the band blew through the chorus and got straight into some weird, deep space jamming that featured Magner heavily using some of the weirder sides of his many synthesizers. Barber made a switch from his Gibson ES-135 to his Parker Fly, and the band started picking up the pace of the jam, lifting it into a sort of mini-peak before they started building on a theme that Barber was creating. After a bit more spacious jamming, they brought the jam into “Voices Insane”, while still maintaining the groove from the “M.E.M.P.H.I.S.” jam going rather than playing the normal tempo of the song.
After grooving along for a bit, Magner played a siren sound that brought the segment into “Lunar Pursuit” which brought with it the first instances of Allen triggering laser beam noises from his drum pad. After a quick peak and a spacey reggae section, they moved into an inverted version of “Naeba” > “Tricycle.” “Naeba” was a nice laid back break from the intensity of “42 ” > “Lunar Pursuit,” and after they’d played through to the beginning of “Naeba”, which was an almost heavenly arpeggiated guitar progression from Barber, they transitioned into the dance party that is “Tricycle.” They kept “Tricycle” nice and spacey while Allen kept the electronic dance beat going. The band built the energy up for one last big peak before segueing back into the set opener “Story of the World” for another verse and chorus to close the set out.