City and Colour launched their first cross-Canada arena tour in five years in Victoria at a sold out Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre Tuesday evening. The show was in support of ‘The Love Still Held Me Near’, the first City and Colour album in four years.
Dallas Green and the band had been in Victoria for a couple days rehearsing for the tour.
They opened their 15 song set with ‘Meant to Be’, the opening track from 2023 album ‘The Love Still Held Me Near’. There would be three other songs from that album in the set. Bassist Erik Nielsen appeared to have a problem with his pedal board early on in the show, but the band pressed on with ‘Northern Blues’ and ‘Thirst’.
One thing you can always expect from a City and Colour show is Dallas Green’s flawlessly smooth and soothing vocals.
Following introducing the band, Green told the audience “This is a new song. If this doesn’t want to make you shake your hips, I don’t know what to do for you, okay?” before going into ‘Hard Hard Time’. He then told a story about walking around earlier in the day by a square reminiscing about performing a show by it with just his guitar. At one of the businesses, he met a girl who had made a ring for him hoping that he might happen to come in.
Due to an 11pm time curfew the band was forced to drop a song from their encore. According to the setlist on stage, that song was ‘Coming Home’.
The final song of the evening was ‘Sleeping Sickness’, a song that originally featured The Tragically Hip’s Gord Downie. Green told the audience, “Today would be Gord Downie’s 60th birthday. The last time that I saw Gord was in this arena. You sing this f***ing song for him, alright?” That final time Green and Downie saw each other was the opening date of The Tragiclaly Hip’s farewell tour on July 22, 2016 In Victoria. City and Colour headlined Rock The Shores the following night.
Tuesday’s concert could easily be considered a double or triple headliner bill with Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats and Ruby Waters in the lineup.
This was Rateliff’s first time in Victoria. It’s been nearly nine years since Rateliff’s runaway hit ‘S.O.B.’ was released. Numerous other singles like ‘You Worry Me’, ‘Survivor’ and ‘I’m On Your Side’ have also received significant airplay on local radio stations. So it’s pretty surprising that in those nine years he has never performed here.
Rateliff being on the bill was clearly a huge draw. Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre was packed by the time they took the stage.
Rateliff took the stage with his seven-piece band and sat at a keyboard near the horn section to start with ‘David and Goliath’. He then stepped away from the keyboard for ‘I’m On Your Side’ to walk and dance around with a suave and engaging stage presence. Rateliff would then play guitar for ‘Survivor’.
Rateliff’s music has qualities of Americana, Folk, Gospel, and Motown that’s mostly high energy. The tempo was brought down temporarily for 2020’s ‘Still Alright’ and ‘Face Down’ before picking right back up with ‘You Worry Me’ and ‘S.O.B’. By the time the set was over Nathaniel Rateliff and The Night Sweats had powered through a 15-song set in about an hour.
Kicking off the night was Shelburne, Ontario’s Ruby Waters. Waters is no stranger to Victoria having performed at Rifflandia, Phillips Reverb and her own sold out Capital Ballroom show within the last two years. This performance felt more down tempo than the past. Bassist Leena Rodriguez and guitarist Marcus Ramsay had their stage interactions like we’re used to, but weren’t running around as much as other shows we’ve seen them perform. Maybe it was to contrast Nathaniel Rateliff or to closer match City and Colour’s style. Waters performed a shorter seven-song set foregoing more upbeat singles like ‘Supernatural’ and ‘Blow’ for mellower tunes like ‘Open Arms’ and ‘Sweet Sublime’. Water’s also performed a new song called ‘Adult Swim’ that is set to be released soon.
Setlists:
Ruby Waters
1. Rabbit Hole
2. Flash Flood
3. Open Arms
4. Breathe
5. Sweet Sublime
6. Adult Swim
7. Quantum Physics
Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats
1. David and Goliath
2. I’m On Your Side
3. Survivor
4. Look It Here
5. Intro
6. Need Never Get Old
7. Little Honey
8. Heartless
9. Hey Mama
10. Still Alright
11. Face Down
12. You Worry Me
13. S.O.B.
14. Time Makes Fools
15. Love Don’t
City and Colour
1. Meant to Be
2. Northern Blues
3. Thirst
4. The Love Still Held Me Near
5. Two Coins
6. We Found Each Other in the Dark
7. Weightless
8. Underground
9. Astronaut
10. Little Hell
11. Hard Hard Time
12. Delaware
13. Bow Down
encore
14. Lover Come Back
15. Sleeping Sickness
