Austin City Limits Taping: Spoon

Aside from ACL Fest last Sunday – and a surprise show at Banger’s on Wednesday – Spoon’s previous performance locally was a 45-minute set in the 175-person Hotel Vegas. A tuneup for the Austinites’ first tour in 29 months, the quintet sweat 16 oldies. New member Alex Fischel wore a ratty t-shirt and intermittently kept a tambourine atop his head.

There was none of that Thursday night at the Moody Theater for a taping of Austin City Limits. Britt Daniel and crew trotted out promptly at 8pm wearing sport jackets and button downs before settling into “Knock Knock Knock,” a slow burn off September’s eighth album They Want My Soul that’s taken the first spot on recent set-lists.

“This is our fourth time taping this show,” allowed Daniel after Transference mindfuck “Who Makes Your Money.” “We’re very proud of that – not going to let that go.”

The audience exerted its most thorough burst of energy a moment later when Eric Harvey hammered out the first lines of “The Way We Get By” on a piano. Sans drums, Jim Eno took an ACL camera to the singer through follow-up “The Ghost of You Lingers,” then jumped back behind the kit for a supremely crisp “Do You” off the new one.

Its immersion into songs from Kill the Moonlight and Gimme Fiction spoke volumes. Spoon’s routinely chased sonic themes throughout each of its first seven albums, but They Want My Soul surveys the full gamut. Thus, the band’s decision to fit “Inside Out” and “Rainy Taxi” between “Don’t Make Me a Target” and “I Turn My Camera On” exhibited the material’s cohesiveness with past Spoon recordings.

At Hotel Vegas, any forays into new material went excluded. This round, transitions sounded seamless.

ACL Live at the Moody Theater set-list Oct. 9, 2014

“Knock Knock Knock”
“Rent I Pay”
“Don’t You Evah”
“Who Makes Your Money”
“The Way We Get By”
“The Ghost of You Lingers”
“Do You”
“The Beast and Dragon, Adored”
“Rhythm & Soul”
“I Just Don’t Understand”
“Don’t Make Me a Target”
“Inside Out”
“Rainy Taxi”
“I Turn My Camera On”
“Got Nuffin”
“Black Like Me”

Encore:

“Outlier”
“They Want My Soul”
“Underdog”