Dave Matthews
White Oak Music Hall
May 2, 2025
Woke up this morning all fat and sassy.
What would you say … if I told you that Dave Matthews, founder and frontman of the venerable band that bears his name, also plays the occasional solo show?
Like you (or maybe not, I tend to go to a lot of these things), I have previously only seen Matthews in the company of the DMB, where his reliably sold-out shows are perhaps as memorable for the obscurity of their set lists as they are for their deceptively loosey-goosey arrangements.
As is the case with many bands of the jam variety, these seemingly lackadaisical performances are held together by some actually tight playing. Members Tim Reynolds, Carter Beauford, and Stefan Lessard (among others) are accomplished musicians, and whether you’re a fan of their music or not (*cough*), you can’t deny the chops.
Which leads to the question: how does Dave Matthews do onstage without the other members of his Band to help out?
Last night offered a rare opportunity to see Matthews on a (relatively) small stage; downstairs at White Oak Music Hall. Even with a limited number of tickets (this was billed as an “exclusive concert for Wells Fargo credit cardholders,” which — full disclosure — I am not), the venue was packed for what turned out to be an intimate gig, showcasing some surprisingly familiar favorites as well as some newer cuts.
Matthews took the stage, featuring a stool, mic, and superfluous amp and said, “I hope we have a good time together” before opening with a cover of Willie Nelson’s “Funny How Time Slips Away.” Which would’ve been more poignant without the dozen or so overly enthusiastic folks in the audience screaming “Willie!” We all know who that is, dudes.
“Crush,” his second song, turned into one of the night’s many singalongs. And I will say, as a veteran of a thousand Houston concert wars, I appreciated the efforts of the DM faithful in keeping the crowd honest. And by “honest,” I mean “somewhat silent.”
Even then, these folks really go nuts for his herky jerky dance moves.
Matthews is a weird cat, is what I’m saying. That would be apparent even if he wasn’t talking about turning things that aren’t upbeat into pretty things (“The Ocean and the Butterfly”) or lamenting our current mindset of “giving up on science and hope.” His frustration with current affairs (“Fuck it fuck it fuck it”) disarmed somewhat by his own occasionally goofy onstage persona.
By his own admission, he was feeling a little addled. The full Dave Matthews Band played the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival last weekend, but stuck around the following week performing at Preservation Hall. Somewhere in the last day there were several bottles of whiskey involved, and Matthews asked us to forgive his “subdued brain activity.”
Which was all bullshit, of course. Matthews is a pro, whether opining about the stray single confetti falling from White Oak’s ceiling (I believe the correct term is “confetto”) or offering the evening’s sole quasi-uncomfortable moment by decrying the current situation in the Middle East: “What’s happening in Gaza is monstrous. And I don’t like being one of the monsters.”
There were a few nervous titters at that, leading into “Don’t Drink the Water,” one of DMB’s most incendiary songs (“All I can say to you my new neighbor/Is you must move on or I will bury you”). I’m not saying the select Wells Fargo Autograph Card members in attendance were uncomfortable at the lyrics, but I’m not *not* saying it.
Fortunately for them, the next song (“So Damn Lucky”) was (probably) about his old Pontiac.
Matthews covered “A Pirate Looks at Forty” next, calling Jimmy Buffet a “sweet guy,” albeit one you apparently didn’t want to cross (sounds accurate). He also introduced a snippet of a new song I think was called “Kill the Monster” (another possible call to political action).
As the evening waned, Matthews adopted a welcome if increasingly familiar tactic of declining to do the whole “walk off stage and wait an arbitrary amount of time for an encore” and instead just launched into a triptych of “Dancing Nancies,” “Some Devil,” and “Two Step.”
Reader, I am torn. As an avowed enemy of jam band nonsense, I should loathe Dave Matthews with every brittle fiber of my being. But I must admit, seeing him in a more intimate setting that allowed him to let his goof flag fly turned my head around. His White Oak show was loose, earnest, and assured. The guy could easily have phoned it in (and I probably would have, were I “enjoying” a whiskey hangover), but he delivered.
Personal Bias: May have mentioned this before, but I was living in the DC area in the mid-1990s when the Dave Matthews Band was hitting its stride. I did not like them, though they were clearly the shit among the UMD sorority girls I waited tables alongside.
The Crowd: Probably at the Masters two weeks ago.
Overheard In The Crowd: “Shhhhh!”
Random Notebook Dump:
ME: Sold many earplugs tonight?
WOMH BARTENDER: Good one.
SET LIST
Funny How Time Slips Away (Willie Nelson cover)
Crush
Walk Around the Moon
Bartender
The Ocean and the Butterfly
Save Me
Here on Out
Grace Is Gone
When the World Ends
Oh
Ants Marching
Rye Whiskey (Tex Ritter cover)
Don’t Drink the Water
So Damn Lucky
#41
A Pirate Looks at Forty (Jimmy Buffett cover)
Madman’s Eyes
Gravedigger
Stay or Leave
(New song) Kill the Monster?
Grey Street
Old Dirt Hill (Bring That Beat Back)
(NON) ENCORE
Dancing Nancies
Some Devil
Two Step
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2025.
