Wilco Plays Final Show In St. Paul Ahead Of Hiatus

It was a bittersweet night for Wilco fans as the band wrapped up a three night run at the Palace Theatre in St. Paul, Minnesota playing their final show of the year, and their last ahead of an announced hiatus that is expected to run through 2018. For their third night in the Twin Cities the seminal indie-rock act treated the sold out crowd to 28-song career-spanning performance featured tracks from ten of their studio albums, which included a handful of rarities for their finale.

Tweedy & Co. opened up the night with “Less Than You Think,” dusting off the quiet and plaintive deep cut from A Ghost Is Born for the first time since 2015, and marking just the 70th time the track has been played since it was debuted back 2002. After a string of tour staples the band reached into their catalog for another rarity offering up “Shouldn’t Be Ashamed.” The tune from their 1995 debut album A.M. was shelved for close to a decade between 1998 and 2008, sans a lone performance in 2005, and was played for just the fifth time this year. Two songs later the six-piece act looked to their double-album Being There for “Sunken Treasure,” playing an acoustic arrangement of the fan-favorite which has been a longtime regular in Tweedy’s solo shows, but trotted out for just the 24th time since 2014.

Wilco continued on the trend of digging deep with “Too Far Apart,” delivering the final track from their debut record for just the second time this year and 93rd overall in their 23 year career. The sextet didn’t ignore their more well-known tunes as they hit on “Jesus Etc.,” “Pot Kettle Black,” “Impossible Germany” and “California Stars,” which once again featured a guest spot from guitarist James Elkington, who served as their opening act. Tweedy returned to to his Uncle Tupelo days next for “We’ve Been Had,” playing a hootenanny version of the song that featured Nels Cline on lap steel and multi-instrumentalist Pat Sansone on bangitar. The band closed out their main set with the country-rocker “I Must Be High,” and trio of heavy-hitters – “Heavy Metal Drummer,” “I’m The Man That Loves You” and “Hummingbird.”

The Chicago-based act returned to the stage for a pair of encores kicking off their first with the another seldom-played song with just the 25th performance of “Hate It Hate,” since the Sky Blue Sky track it was in semi-heavy rotation in back in 2012. “Casino Queen” and “Hoodoo Voodo” from Mermaid Avenue ended their first encore. Wilco closed out their last show for the foreseeable future with “Monday” and “Outtasite (Outta Mind),” before treating the sold out crowd to one more rarity as they wrapped up the night with “The Lonely 1.”

Check out the full setlist below: