Shows/1988-12-16
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Links:
Setlist:
Electric Set:
- Istanbul (Not Constantinople)
- Ana Ng
- Your Racist Friend
- Kiss Me, Son Of God
- Put Your Hand Inside The Puppet Head
- Number Three
- Toddler Hiway (a capella)
- I'll Sink Manhattan
- Where Your Eyes Don't Go
- Snowball In Hell
- Why Does The Sun Shine?
- Purple Toupee
- The Famous Polka
- I've Got A Match
- Santa's Beard
- Lie Still, Little Bottle
- Don't Let's Start
- Cowtown
- She's An Angel
Encore:
They Might Be Giants
— with The Balancing Act opening —
Cabaret Metro in Chicago, IL
December 16, 1988 at 7:30pm (all ages); 11pm (over 21)
Fan Recaps and Comments:
It was a snowy Friday night in Chicago. I was 15, and at the early show. My dad, a true champ, came to the show but had drifted away to give me and my friend space, probably heading up to the balcony.
The stage was flanked with three giant prints of the head from the Don't Lets Start video. During the wait for the Johns to come on, I talked with a group of other kids around my age next to me. "Who is that?" "We should ask." We agreed to shout "WHO THE FUCK IS THAT??" in between songs.
During a quick break, we did it. We screamed in unison, asking the all-important question.
Flansburgh gave us a patient, but cryptic response: "He's the guy in the encyclopedia where E.B. White should be."
The next song started. The rest of the show was incredible. I committed Flansburgh's statement to memory.
The next day, I went into my school's library and headed to the encyclopedias. For each set, I picked up the W volume, looked up E.B. White, and... found an entry E.B. White. I had almost exhausted my options, but there was one more set of encyclopedias, the cheap ones in the corner, the ones nobody used. I searched for E.B. White.
He wasn't there.
But in his place was an entry on William Allen White, with a portrait, the very same as we saw hanging on stage, in the early videos, and down on the bottom of this very page.
Pure magic.
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