George Thorogood @ The Birchmere

George Thorogood & the Delaware Destroyers
The Birchmere, Alexandria, Va.
Aug. 1, 2007

The past two summers, I’ve turned back the clock with my concert-ticket purchases. Last August, I ended a 17-year boycott by attending a Bob Dylan show. Last week, I saw my first George Thorogood concert since 1992. In both cases, I’m glad I finally got back in the game.

My long hiatus between Dylan stemmed from catching him on one of his infamous off nights the summer after seeing a great show. I wasn’t interested in gambling the price of a ticket on seeing another stinker, so I stayed away until a friend convinced me to give it another try. But I had no axe to grind with Thorogood. I had just drifted onto other things. My tastes had changed from mostly blues and rock as a teen and early twentysomething to more twang in my 30s. I hadn’t purchased a Thorogood disc since 1991’s “Boogie People.” But a co-worker talked me into going to last week’s show with some other colleagues, and I’m glad he did.

We got the tickets a couple of months early, so I had plenty of time to speculate. The shows I had attended were high-energy. Would Thorogood, at 56, still be able to give it that much gas? Would I even still enjoy the songs, especially the ones I had heard over and over again?

I was reasonably sure of one thing: That the set list would likely comprise 60-75 percent of the tunes that Thorogood played the last time I saw him. I’m not sure if that prediction was entirely accurate, but it was at worst pretty close. Regardless, Thorogood turned in a great set of high-octane blues-rock at the Birchmere that seemed to satisfy all in attendance.

I don’t know why I had any doubts. Maybe all the criticism Thorogood takes from the blues “purists” had crept into my mind. I say “purists” in quotes because it’s a term that also should be viewed with skepticism. Who should be the arbiters of what constitutes “pure” blues, and what doesn’t? And should those people be self-appointed?

It doesn’t strike me that there’s anything inauthentic about what Thorogood does. Sure, there’s nothing subtle about his delivery. You get loud guitars and songs about booze and women. In fact, you get a whole lot of both. He’s not reproducing all the intricacies of old Robert Johnson records, but so what? Back in Johnson’s day, blues singers went from town to town to entertain people, not to create an art form that would be worshipped by predominately white, college-educated audiences and “blues societies.” They played dances, fairs and street corners. The goal was getting people to dance, not revel in bullshit tales about souls being sold to the devil. As I looked around the Birchmere, I didn’t see anyone that appeared to be having a bad time or criticizing Thorogood’s technique. I didn’t partake myself, but there was a fair bit of dancing going on.

There’s nothing sophisticated about Thorogood’s style. He picks on big Gibson guitars, and turns them up loud. In the mid ’80s, his crunchy, buzzsaw slide guitar was instantly recognizable on the radio. Likewise, there’s no secret to his success; he gives the paying customers what they want. Namely, said loud guitars and songs about whiskey, wine and feeling fine. On this evening, he provided all of the above.

Even if you aren’t necessarily a fan of Thorogood’s music, you’ve got to appreciate his showmanship. He took to the Birchmere stage like a conquering hero, fists in the air as if he just dropped Mike Tyson with a hard left to the body. He strapped on his guitar, and kicked the evening off by quoting another heavyweight – Jackie Gleason. “How sweet it is!” Thorogood said, and the band tore into “Rock Party,” from Thorogood’s latest disc, 2006’s “The Hard Stuff.”

One of the most significant changes since I last saw Thorogood was in the band. Second guitarist Jim “Shotgun” Suhler joined up in 2002, and he got plenty of work on this night. He took the first solo on “Rock Party,” and stepped into the spotlight with solos during “The Fixer,” “I Drink Alone” and “Cocaine Blues.” Suhler led the band out for the first encore tune, “Love Doctor,” and kicked it off with some jamming that segued into part of Jimmy Page’s solo from Led Zeppelin’s “Heartbreaker” before settling into the bluesy groove of “Love Doctor.” Thorogood didn’t even play guitar on the song, the only time that occurred all night.

Even if he has ceded some of the spotlight in the past 15 years, Thorogood, who resembles James Coburn even more with age, still is the undisputed star of the show. He dressed in black from head to toe save his snakeskin headband. He stalked, spun and duck-walked across the stage all night. After Suhler’s solo on “Rock Party,” Thorogood stepped up for a solo of his own consisting mostly of clangorous double-stops a la Chuck Berry. During Bo Diddley’s “Who Do You Love,” Thorogood teased the front row with slow glissandos down his low E string. Watching the cocksure grin on his face as he waved the guitar neck back and forth it was easy to imagine what the first caveman to wield fire might have looked like when he was brandishing that glowing torch in front of the awestruck tribe.

The presentation was as subtle as a punch in the face, but its success was just as palpable. Though there were a handful of tunes in the set list from the past five our six years, the bulk of the show comprised the old, tried-and-true favorites: “I Drink Alone,” “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer,” “Gear Jammer” and Thorogood’s best-known tune, “Bad to the Bone.”

If you’ve seen one Thorogood show, you’ve seen a lot of this before. And he openly acknowledges that. During his nightly showcase, John Lee Hooker’s “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer,” Thorogood says to the cheering crowd (15 years ago, and on this night), “I take it some of you folks have heard this story before. Well you’re gonna hear it again, motherhumpers. And again and again and again and again and again… .” It seems like it should get old, but it really doesn’t. Perhaps that’s because Thorogood doesn’t get above his raisin’. He doesn’t do concept albums. He keeps alive the memories of Berry, Diddley, Hooker, Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy Waters. He dedicates “Cocaine Blues” to Johnny and June Carter Cash as well as the working people. Finally, he takes time to recognize those blue-collar folks, reminding the concertgoers to tip their hard-working bartenders, as “they don’t live on compliments.”

After such a long time away, I was pleased to discover that I’m still completely entertained by a stripped-down rock-and-roll show. Or, in Lonesome George’s parlance, “the Wednesday night jamboree and hootenanny at the Birchmere in Alexandria, Virginia.” I also was pleased to discover that the last tune of the night, in the second encore, was an old favorite -- Elmore James’ “Madison Blues.” If I hadn’t been surrounded by so many co-workers I might have taken Thorogood’s advice he dispensed before the last song. “You can go to work tomorrow and tell that square standing next to you, ‘I was there, and you blew it.’ ”

I didn’t blow it. Thorogood didn’t blow it either. As Dylan did the summer before, he put on a great show and brought back a lot of happy thoughts of younger, simpler times. As summer comebacks go, I’m 2-for-2. I only wish the late, great Stevie Ray Vaughan was still around for a trip down memory lane.

Set List
Rock Party
Who Do You Love?
The Fixer
Night Time
I Drink Alone
One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer
Cocaine Blues
I Got My Eyes on You
Get a Haircut
Gear Jammer
Move it on Over
Encore
Love Doctor
Bad to the Bone
Second encore
Madison Blues