Staff Editor on September 25th, 2018

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By TORR LEONARD

The The,  the British group centered around songwriter Matt Johnson, spent two-plus decades making shape-shifting rock music with an inclination for pointed commentary. On a chilly Monday night at the sold-out Ford Theatre — part of the “Comeback Special” tour that returned the band to the U.S. for first time since 2000 — they felt (not-so-strangely) relevant as ever.

Johnson, 57, was backed by a four-piece band consisting of James Eller on bass (representing the “Versus The World” tour), DC Collard on keyboards (representing the “Lonely Planet” tour) and Earl Harvin on drums (representing the “Naked” tour).

The only completely new member is Barrie Cadogan on guitar, who has his own band (Little Barrie) and who has played live with Primal Scream, Spiritualized and Morrissey (so there’s your six-degrees-of-separation from The The alum Johnny Marr).

It was a restrained performance during which some of The The’s best-known songs were decelerated for effect. It hit home during songs like 1989’s “The Beat(en) Generation,” whose lyrics still resonate:

“When you cast your eyes upon the skylines of this / Once proud nation

Can you sense the fear and the hatred / Growing in the hearts of its population?

Our youth, oh youth, are being seduced / By the greedy hands of politics and half truths.

The beaten generation, the beaten generation / Reared on a diet of prejudice and misinformation”

With his trademark three-microphone setup, Johnson and company began the night lit in silhouette for the jazz-ish “Global Eyes,” one of two tracks played off their last album, 2000’s “Naked Self” (the other being “Soul Catcher”). With no new album to promote Johnson said he felt free to just play their favorite songs for the fun of it.

Opening the show with a jazz-esque song was fitting since the vibe of the whole show was a stripped-down, hushed one. Johnson warned that he was starting to have issues with his voice and that he would be singing some songs in a lower octave than normal, which ended up suiting the mood of the night. On multiple occasions during the show, Johnson even asked for silence from the crowd so that he could soak up the peace and quiet of the hillside setting, complete with the sound of the crickets.

Numerous songs were slowed-down drastically from their album versions: “Sweet Bird of Truth,” “The Beat(en) Generation” and “Beyond Love.” There was also no harmonica at any point in the show; it was instead replaced with melodica on “Dogs of Lust,” “The Beat(en) Generation” and “Slow Emotion Replay.” “This Is the Day” even lacked an accordion; a synthesizer took its place.

After playing “Heartland” (for which Barrie admirably provided the normally-female backing vocals), Johnson remarked that crowds in nearly every other country the band plays heartily sing out the line “This is the 51st state / of the USA,” but not so in the U.S.

Before “Armageddon Days Are Here (Again),” Johnson mentioned that it was was supposed to have been a single back in 1989, but that it was “banned” from the radio due to a Salman Rushdie controversy around that same time.

As is so often the case with The The, death hung over the proceedings. They played their recent single “We Can’t Stop What’s Coming,” which has previously been dedicated to Matt’s late brother Andy “Dog” Johnson. And they also played 1993’s “Love Is Stronger Than Death,” which Johnson said was written after the passing of his younger brother Eugene (the song featured an organ instead of the signature harmonica riff).

Johnson returned for the first song of the encore by himself for a nearly spoken-word version of “True Happiness This Way Lies,” accompanied solely by his gently plucked electric guitar. He broke from the solemnity for a lighter moment, stopping the song briefly after the line “I ain’t ever found peace upon the breast of a girl.” He laughed and said. “That’s not true. I usually try to write true things, but that’s false. I have often found peace upon the breast of a girl. From my mother’s breast when I was a child, to my current girlfriend’s breast. And hopefully many more in the future!”

The night was closed out with 1983’s “Uncertain Smile,” which includes that classic piano solo that seems to go on forever, but somehow never feels self-indulgent.

||| Live: The The headline the Palladium tonight.