Friday night I had the pleasure of seeing Eels perform at the Showbox (at the Market – Cat Power was down at SoDo). A great night overall.

I coerced a coworker/friend to pre-funk with me at the Green Room while I waited for the show to start. They no longer have fried okra on their menu, but their mac-n-cheese is pretty good. I waited until the line had subsided to go in, which turned out to be good timing. I had just enough time to buy a hoodie (with the little bird on it), buy another drink, and find a good vantage point before they turned down the lights.

There was no opening act. Instead, they projected a BBC Scotland documentary that Mark Oliver Everett made about his late father, physicist Hugh Everett III. Fascinating portrait. And even though physics was never my strong point, all the science talk made me giddy.

After the film ended, Mr E (Mark) came onto the stage with his band, “the Chet”. I assume this to be Chet Lyster, who is listed on Eels Wikipedia page as one of the former members. The Chet played accompaniment on most songs, and on quite a variety of instruments. Lap steel, theramin, drums, guitar are the ones that come to mind. There might have been one or two others. E played guitar mostly, switching between two guitars for each song. When he wasn’t playing guitar, he played piano. And at one point, he did a cool little switcheroo with Chet on the drums, where he stepped in – literally – and took over without missing a beat.

They played for probably and hour and a half, it seemed, including two “encores”. A very fine performance. Afterward, I didn’t have bus fare, so I walked home in the near perfect weather. A pretty good ending to a wonderful night.