Ben Folds Five Reunite For One Show

One of the highlights of the Ben Folds Five reunion show Thursday night on the University of North Carolina campus in Chapel Hill came during the band’s performance of its final single, “Army.” It’s the quintessential college-rock song in which the protagonist ponders leaving school. When Folds sang the line, “I thought about the Army I dropped out and joined a band instead,” the packed house of college students and longtime followers let out a deafening roar of approval.

It was the inaugural event for Myspace’s new music series “Front To Back,” which showcases prominent artists performing a key album in its entirety. The Five performed its swan song, 1999’s The Unauthorized Biography Of Reinhold Messner, which was neither the band’s highest-charting disc (that was Whatever and Ever Amen, with its #6 Modern Rock hit “Brick”) nor its best reviewed. In retrospect, though, the loose concept album with musical debts to the Who and Joe Jackson was not only the most logical choice for the format but it also may be the band’s most enduring work.

From Darren Jesse’s clattering, Keith Moon-like drumming in “Narcolepsy” to Robert Sledge’s bowed bass and Folds’ jazz-crazed piano part at the end of “Hospital Song,” the three were always art-rockers disguised as pop stars. But after performing the album, the Five pulled out all the stops in a seven-song encore of earlier material culminating in the noisy, abrasive “Song For The Dumped,” which Folds capped off by smashing his piano stool into the keyboard.

Sitting front and center, fans Jeremy Cox, 25, and Kaylor Otwell, 23, had driven more than 500 miles, from Birmingham, Alabama, to see the historic reunion. “This album came out on my birthday in 1999 and I was going to see them but they but broke up,” said Cox. “I wasn’t going to miss this.”

Set List:

01. Narcolepsy
02. Don’t Change Your Plans
03. Mess
04. Magic
05. Hospital Song
06. Army
07. Your Redneck Past
08. Your Most Valuable Possession (Featuring Dean Folds)
09. Regrets
10. Jane
11. Lullabye

Encore:

01. Jackson Cannery
02. Eddie Walker
03. Selfless, Cold and Composed
04. Battle of Who Could Care Less
05. Where’s Summer B?
06. Julianne
07. Song for the Dumped

Thanks for the info to Rollingstone.com.

Comments

[wemonir]

ben folds is, and ben folds five were, amazing.

[This1GoesTo11]

Ah, I wish was there. What a great album.

[Netherian]

who?

[Seymore190]

This would have been dope! Good set, I wonder who Dean Folds is. Brother? Father?

[cpick2014]

one of the greatest bands ever, and ben folds solo is equally as amazing. love the band. would have paid tons of money to get into that show...

[The_String_Man]

Netherian wrote:

who?

where are you from?

anyways a good set but no brick..

[Like I Is]

I wish it was streamed online. Ads were plastered all over Myspace for a month.

I hear a recording of the show will be released on DVD in October though. I hope that's the case.

I would've killed to be there.

[chrisdazzo]

I'd give anything to have been there and seen them live. Of all the bands... Damn!

[ZeppelinruleZ]

I live in Minnesota and I would've driven there in a heartbeat if I'd have known about it. Ben Folds Five is freakin sweet!

[metaldog_USMC]

How can you truly have an epic reunion concert when the band itself has been famous less than a decade. Jeez, our generation needs to learn some patience.

[SaintChris]

Folds used to smash his stool into the piano all the time. I think he even did it when i saw him at Prospect Park in 2005.

[kamayzing]

Folds = God

[CSguitarvocal]

Gotta love the BFF. I wish I got to go I've seen Ben on his own, but his energy in no way is as high as if he's with Ben folds Five.

[estabon37]

From Wikipedia:
The vocal portion of "Your Most Valuable Possession" consists of message left on Folds' answering machine by his father, Dean Folds, while he was partially asleep.

You know, I'm pretty sure I've wasted at least 62% of the last year of my life on Wikipedia. I feel dirty.