Kevin Morby’s first club performance as a solo artist in San Francisco Tuesday evening had all the earmarks of the way he carried out his important roles in both The Babies and Woods. With hundreds of dates played as a member of those two bands in just the last few years, Morby now glides onto a stage, sets it up and then wows you. He has done it night after night with lots of miles in between. The fan on the floor doesn’t see the routine before the show. The practice, the sound check, the van rides and the internal deliberations as the tour hits inevitable potholes. What’s great about this current endeavor is that Morby now owns it for the stretch he‘s up there. He runs it. He writes it. He sings it. He strums it. And he does it with the bar set high on fullness of sound from surrounding personnel who seem to share Morby’s humble but serious stage presence.

The show at Rickshaw Stop on Fell Street near SF City Hall was the first of 30 scheduled gigs Morby will do as the opener for the great Welsh rock and roller Cate Le Bon. What’s interesting about Morby’s pairing with Le Bon is that the two share multi-instrumentalists Huw Evans and Will Canzoneri. In addition, Le Bon (real name is Cate Timothy) makes an appearance during Morby’s set to sing her part on the song Slow Train. The collaborative connection between the two acts (each have their own unique drummer) is deep and likely an enjoyable and more economical way to pull off a long tour.

There was no apparent nervousness from Morby as he went on about 915 PM with Evans and drummer Justin Sullivan. The crowd was late-arriving, kinda small but enthusiastic. Morby played eight songs over a period of 37 minutes. Three of the eight do not appear on Morby’s new record Harlem River and could pass for Babies tunes given their pacing and energy. The number Morby opened with was super catchy and I wanna hear it again. The only Harlem River songs omitted from the set were Reign, Dead Don’t Come Back and If You Leave.

Here’s the set list:

Two non-album tunes. Both great.
3. Sucker in the Void
4. Harlem River (Canzoneri comes on.  Great bass riff from Evans. Running time of only six and a half minutes vs. nine plus on the record
5. Wild Side
6. Slow Train (Le Bon on)
7. Miles, Miles, Miles (Great Morby jam) 
8. Non-album song.  Call My Name or My Life?

The crowd swelled a bit for Le Bon’s set. She played Sisters (my favorite tune off Mug Museum) early on. The trippy guitar sound makes the song. Le Bon called this show her “first time” playing San Francisco because her only previous appearance in SF “sucked.” Said Le Bon: “We’re gonna wipe the slate clean and say this is our first time.”

Admission to the show was just $10. The venue was good. It may have been a little oversized but the sound was solid. I first arrived at the show at about 815 PM. It was completely empty so I exited and wandered west on Market to look for a tavern where I could pass about 45 minutes. I ended up at Martuni’s and ordered a “Martuni.” This was a big mistake. The drink was excellent but the amount of booze in it detonated a near-immediate downward pull into a vortex of intoxication. It set the stage for big mistake #2 which was a decision to order a special jumbo brown liquor combo cocktail at Rickshaw just before Morby went on. The combined net effect of the two drinks well exceeded the potency of what I’m currently able to process. Badly debilitated from the alcohol by night’s end, I failed to convey my appreciation of the performance in a coherent manner when I spoke to Morby after the show.

If there’s any silver lining to the over-consumption, it would have to be the absence of any apprehension about the midnight walk through the Tenderloin back to the hotel.

I stayed at the Adante on Geary which is where my Dad and I stayed for a baseball trip earlier this year. The elevator wasn’t working but the price was right and the room was clean. I love the location. It sits just below a steep hill so you never really get over-taxed physically to reach it.

I had fish tacos at Pancho Villa Tacqueria on 16th Street before the show. Excellente.

A vendor sold mistletoe on Powell near the cable car turnaround and the city had plenty of Christmas vibe. You’re starting to see evidence of the massive subway construction project in the city‘s center. Known as the “Central Subway” project, San Francisco is digging huge underground tunnels that will enable train service linking the Caltrain Station near the ballpark all the way up to Chinatown and perhaps beyond. Still about five years from completion, it’s refreshing to see such an ambitious public transit improvement underway in one of this country’s great cities.

The coast-to-coast airplane rides just 24 hours apart were a study in contrast. On the way out, I sat in an aisle seat in the second-to-last row of the airplane. When people exited the rear lavatory across the aisle, many seemed to pinball off me given the lack of balance one can feel in that setting. Something about that particular seat seems to be a magnet for accidental contact. Add to that several crying babies and the six-hour Westbound trip was definitely not as good as the five-hour return. Coming back to New York, I sat on a window in the back with the middle seat empty and got really comfortable. The cabin was quiet and gradually darkened with a couple hours to go in the trip.

The Morby / Le Bon tour doesn’t make it to NYC until January 16, 2014.