The Replacements last show

I don't get to as many rock shows as some rock show go-ers get to in this world but there is one rock show feather I can stick in my cap.  The Replacements last ever show.  It was July 4th, 1991 in Chicago in Grant Park along Lake Michigan.  Being this the pre-internets age I wasn't aware of the rumors that this indeed could possibly be their last show ever.  I was just going to see one of my favorite bands of all time.

Like with many other bands that I have come to love, er, um or obsess over, I came late the The Replacements (swinging) party.  I had heard of them as early as '85 through a friend but at that time I had the car floored with all things Springsteen.  I didn't see The Replacements until the "Don't Tell A Soul" tour of 1989 at the Aragon Ballroom.  I ended up seeing them, all told, a modest 4 times and one of them being at the vanilla confines of Poplar Creek Music Theater opening for Tom Petty.

Let's get back to the 4th of July in 1991, shall we?  Nothing like blogging about things from almost 20 years ago, huh?  I went with this dude that I worked with.  He was a muscle man.  We get to Grant Park and the line is wrapped all the way around the block.  I think my friend pretty much said, "F--- dis" and proceeds to walk towards the front of the line, walk, walk, walk, I'm following behind him but I didn't want to get greedy about where we were gonna, um, cut in line.  No wait, we just blended into the line since it was a mass of humanity as it was at Taste of Chicago.  As we got closer to the front of the line I'm saying to my friend, "Ron, cut in here, Ron, cut in here, cut in here".  He keeps walking towards the front.  I play along, he slides in right near the front of the line with me close behind.  I figured either no one really noticed that we cut or since he is bulging at his pecs, lats, and biceps and all things muscles I figured even if anyone did notice they didn't want to mess with him.  Once we got in and found seats (yes, seats, not the lawn) I asked Ron if he heard me saying "cut in here" and he said he did but he figured as long as we are cutting why not go for broke?

This was one of the WXRT sponsored shows so needless to say, they probably plugged it ad infinitum.  The other bands on the bill were NRBQ and Material Issue with the late Jim Ellison on vocals.  The show itself was about an hour with the set list heavy on songs from their last record, "All Shook Down".  It was almost Replacements-by-numbers but I wouldn't go so far to say they just phoned it in either.  Looking back at a review from Bill Wyman from the Chicago Reader, I see that they did play nuggets as "Within Your Reach", "Unsatisfied", and "Can't Hardly Wait".  The one thing that did happen that was very Replacements-esque was that they switched instruments during the last song, "Hootenanny" and then handed them off to roadies as they left the stage for the last time. One regret from XRT dj Frank E. Lee that I read in one of their old XRT newsletters was that one of the Replacements handed his guitar to Frank for him to go out and play during the encore.  For whatever reason, Lee declined.

Throughout the years there have been rumors and Internet buzz about Replacements reunions or even Paul Westerberg and Tommy Stinson getting together in some aspect and calling it The Replacements and those rumors remain just that, rumors.  Personally, I think breaking up as they did and staying broken up only adds to their scruffy legacy.