The Berkshire Eagle (Pittsfield, Massachusetts) June 28, 2006 Wednesday SECTION: NIGHTLIGHTS HEADLINE: Robbie Fulks plays Helsinki –with a band BYLINE: By Dave Madeloni, Eagle Correspondent BODY: The beauty of July 4th weekend is that Sunday night is essentially a bonus Saturday night. When Robbie Fulks invades Club Helsinki on Sunday night he is sure to set the tone with his signature tune, “Let’s Kill Saturday Night,” a song that rocksharder and smarter than Elton John’s “Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting.” Fulks is a wildly talented Chicago-based singer-songwriter who rarely comes to these parts with a band in tow, preferring to travel light with just his battered acoustic guitar. But Sunday is billed as a band gig, which makes this particular performance one not to miss. I caught Robbie and his mates at last year’s South By Southwest Festival in Austin, and the alt-country songs from his highly praised latest, “Georgia Hard,” really took off. In an interview posted at www.robbiefulks.com , the acerbic Fulks – whose hilarious between-songs banter on stage is worth the price of admission — discussed the difference between flying solo and fronting a band. “Every time I’m on stage with the band and we bust into some up-tempo dancy little thing, I think, ‘I’ll never play another solo set again.’ Every time I load in a club for a solo show with my acoustic in one hand and my crate of merchandise in the other, I think, ‘I’ll never play with the band again.’ (And when I get to keep all the money at the end of the night, the thought definitely recurs.) I like getting to do both, with maybe a 3-to-1 ratio favoring band shows. “The main difference in the sets is there’s a wider range of songs to choose from when I’m alone, and I never come into a solo show with a set list (our band shows have loose set lists more often than not). And in the hotel room after the show I can relax and read ’National Review’ late into the night without being distracted by my guitarist watching soft-core Danny Bonaduce ski-sex comedies on HBO.”

Needless to say, he’s right about NR being much cooler than watching just about anything on TV late into the night.. You subscribe by now, don’t you?