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So, my sister-in-law, Tammy, and I went to see Jars of Clay last night in Marion. Marion is about an hour north of Columbus, but Jars isn’t coming to Columbus on this tour, so this was the closest we could find. This was my 7th Jars show (1 – opening for MWS and Newsboys 2- Bubblemaker’s dream tour @ Veteran’s Memorial 3 – Tour 101 in Dayton 4 – with Plumb and Third Day at King’s Island 5 – at the Newport Music Hall in Columbus 6 – at Capital University last year)
Two new artists were the opening acts. The first was Trevor Morgan. He was pretty good. Had a rather nice voice despite having strep throat. Might be worth further investigation. The second act was Sarah Kelly. Her voice was not what one would expect from her appearance. She had a lot of energy and a voice I liked. Tammy was not so impressed, but I kinda like the raspy rock-girl voice. (Tammy also doesn’t like Leigh Nash’s voice, so take her opinion with a grain of salt [grin]). Unfortunately, I wasn’t as impressed with her songs.
After a short break to reset the stage, Jars came out. They started with Sunny Days and Amazing Grace from the new album. They played a very nice mix of old and new. I thought they had only played 3-4 songs from Who We Are Instead, but as we listened to it later, I think they actually played a majority of the album. Jars has gained so much more comfort and stage presence over the years. They used to seem somewhat uncomfortable up there, but now, they can joke about how they were trying out a new set list on us and had some stage conversations. Dan accidentally let go of the microphone during “Flood” when he was holding it out to the audience (which was done in the late middle of the concert, not at the end! Woo-Hoo!) and made a joke later about fishing with it. They just seemed really happy and relaxed, which made for the best Jars show I’ve seen. They played lots of favorites: Frail, Flood, Love Song for a Savior, Amazing Grace, and the one song I’ve seen them perform at every concert (and my personal favorite Jars song, that works out well): World’s Apart. They played around with “Jesus Blood Never Failed Me Yet” at the end of Worlds and it really worked. This was after they had “ended” with Revolution and gone off stage. During the first half of the show, Dan said, “Next we have an old Irish tune for you.” and they started in on a (I think) U2 tune. I can’t find it on the U2 lyrics page, it has something to do with showing love in the language of the person who needs to hear it. If you know what song it is, let me know!
After the brief break, they played World’s Apart, then two spirituals: Canaan Bound and I’ll Fly Away. Both done so well. Then they were done. Much too early, IMO.
Overall, it was the best Jars concert I’ve been to. The baby even liked it … or at least, he [generic he] moved around a lot during the show. We got back to Columbus before 11, so that wasn’t too bad for a work night.