I can't believe it's been so long, but I haven't seen IKE in over three months!  Work's been busy lately, and I went away for a week, so I haven't been getting to as many shows lately, but I still can't believe it's been so long.

I was able to rectify that problem tonight, as IKE was playing a concert in the park, sponsored by the city of Philadelphia and Mayor Michael Nutter.  Q102 was also on the scene, which seemed a little odd as IKE's music is nothing like anything they'd play...

I got to the park as the first band of the night was finishing up.  I think they're name was The New Old Fashioned.  Then we got to listen to some awesome Q102 tunes as IKE got ready to take the stage.  One of Q102's DJs introduced the band, commenting on how Into Philadelphia was played at both Eagles and Phillies games.  He got the crowd by asking who were fans of each team, then turned the show over to the band who started off with the very song that the DJ had talked about.

After getting the big hit out of the way, John asked the crowd to make some noise, and they moved on to Whites of My Eyes.  John then talked about how they would play many songs from their new CD during the show, pointing out that it was available at a table toward the back of the park, and the band played another song from the album, Atomic Rose.  That was followed by Just A Moment, which sounded really good, and I really liked how John's voice sounded.  I was worried that the sound wouldn't be so great because outdoor shows sometimes have problems with that, but the sound system was actually very good, and I really liked the big, full sound it gave to John's voice.

The band got ready for the next song, and John pointed out that things were about to get loud as they went into Better Off Alone.  As IKE tuned for their next song, John thanked the mayor for sponsoring the show and pushed the band's CDs again, then they went into We Like Sugar.  The song sounded good, but Brett's mic was pretty loud, which it was all night, but it seemed especially noticeable on this song.  During the chorus, Brett's "ah" harmonies were nearly drowning out John's lead vocals, which was really weird.

IKE's next song was What I See In You, which started with Brett playing the intro while the rest of the band was getting ready, and it sounded really cool when everyone came in.  They followed that up witch Cinderella Spark, which was nice to hear since it doesn't make its way onto IKE's set list as often as it used to.  After that, the band played Say Luvva, which is one of my favorite IKE songs, and it sounded great.

John moved on by explaining the next song as being about bottling things up for a long time, and he suggested that the crowd not follow the song's example.  The song was Deathbed (Na, Na, Na), which is always fun, but it was even more fun with John's flying leap during Brett's solo.  Following the song, John talked about how they were supposed to end the show at dusk, and it was already getting pretty dark, so they were going to have to start.  The band was then told that they could play one more, so they decided to end with a song that John described as being a little more positive than Deathbed.  I thought (and was hoping) it would be Message of Love, but instead, then ended up playing End of the Rope, which is also a very good song.  When I got the set list later, I saw that they actually cut out Message of Love, which was scheduled to go right before End of the Rope, so the unexpected end to the set squeezed the song out.

It was really good to see IKE again, and they put on a really good show.  There's never much energy in the crowd in a place like this because everyone's kind of spread out and there aren't usually many people that are familiar with the band, but that never seems to affect IKE's performance.  They bring the same energy to their shows no matter how many people are there to see it, so you're always certain to get a good show when IKE takes the stage!