We’d planned to have coffee before the show, but after soundcheck Berman asked if we couldn’t please put it off till the following day so he could grab a nap. He gave me his wife’s cell-phone number and told me to get in touch the following day. It would have to be a breakfast meeting, and somehow I couldn’t picture him getting up early enough. So I asked Bob Nastanovich — the Silver Jews tour manager and former Pavement member — to try to get him ready by 9 am. “Don’t worry, boss,” was Nastanovich’s easy response.
Six hours later, I was still awake, listening to the tape I’d made of the show, waiting for Nastanovich’s call, which wouldn’t come till 10, too late for deadline. I remembered how Berman had leaned over his guitar during every song, flipping pages on his music stand, turning his back to the crowd whenever he solo’d. He’d joked that the most humiliating part of the “whole live thing” was the encore charade. Nevertheless, the Silver Jews played two Sunday, and as the final note of the second one faded, the overhead lights dimmed and the room was left illuminated by two moon-like yellow spotlights mounted on either side of the stage. Soon those faded, and for a moment, just before the house lights came up, the only illumination in the entire downstairs was the tiny lamp of Berman’s music stand, a stark sign that the show so many fans had waited for had come to a close.
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Quitters, tinklers, tacklers, and whoppers, Becoming Berman - side, Silver Jew | Drag City DVD, More 
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Topics:
Live Reviews
, Silver Jews, David Berman
