Ben Folds & Tall Heights - Live at Forest Hills Stadium, 2018 (Webcast)

Performed live on August 17th, 2018, at the Forest Hills Stadium in Queens, NY
Audio remastered by Hollie Taylor.

Ben recently announced on his Instagram that he will be recording with Tall Heights for his next album. While we wait for this new release, which hopefully is due by the end of the year, I decided to upload this gig where he plays with the group from his tour with them. If I had to describe how Ben gels with these guys, I'd say it's similar to yMusic in many ways. The main difference is the variety in instruments as well as the addition of new vocal harmonies to most songs. Ben has always done layered harmonies no matter who he records with, but these guys provide a lot to Ben's songs with their added complexity. I definitely like how they sound with Ben live, and I'm hoping to be impressed even more with the studio recordings. The last thing I'll note is the setlist. It's almost entirely comprised of songs that have been released as singles, but the majority are singles that Ben doesn't play live too often. Tall Heights transforms them all in really unique ways, especially Do It Anyway which is spectacular here.

The remaster was pretty minimal, but I decided to include an audio recording of Rockin' the Suburbs. This song is the most radically different arrangement, with the others being pretty much what you'd expect from a Ben concert. They add a lot more of a folksy twang to the song, which I like a fair bit. Definitely very unique.

☆Timestamps☆
00:00 Intro
02:15 Phone in a Pool
06:13 The Ascent of Stan
10:36 Annie Waits
14:47 Battle of Who Could Care Less
19:16 Forest Hills Theme
[LEVI JOHNSTON'S BLUES]
22:18 So There
26:39 Brick
31:44 You Don't Know Me
35:03 Jesusland
40:47 Still Fighting It
45:16 Do It Anyway
50:23 Landed
55:11 Zak and Sara
58:40 Rockin' the Suburbs
1:04:42 Not the Same Intro
1:06:29 Not the Same
1:11:51 Outro ​

[nepinsk]

I was at this show! Fantastic from everyone

[mikesutter]

His voice was in rough shape for this tour (relative to the rest of his career where he sounds pretty damn good across the board). He seems to have bounced back well for the post-Covid shows.