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Mempho Fest Night 2 (10/4/2025)
- watlopodcast
- Oct 12
- 7 min read
Listen to the entire show on Nugs or Relisten or Archive.org.
Data mined and explored via Everyday Companion.
Thumbnail picture taken by JD Swenson. Before getting into the recap, we’re excited to announce that We Are The Lucky Ones has published show recaps since the 2025 Red Rocks Run, making this the sixth run to report nerdy stats and fun information about our beloved band and the songs they choose to play for us. This show witnessed a lot of repeats from previous recaps, as festival sets seem to do, so rather than repeating deep dives for each song, we thought it would be easier to provide a short cut to other write-ups (the number in the parentheses is the number of shows this song has been played in 2025):
Bust It Big (7) | |||||
Travelin’ Light (4) | |||||
TPOT (4) | |||||
Imitation Leather Shoes (4) | |||||
Travelin’ Man (4) | |||||
The Waker (4) | |||||
Jamais Vu (3) | |||||
Greta (6) | |||||
Life During Wartime (4) | |||||
FWIW (4) | |||||
Tall Boy (7) | |||||
King Baby (10) | |||||
Saint Ex (7) | |||||
PAYMH (6) | |||||
Diner (6) | |||||
C. Brown (4) | |||||
All Time Low (7) | |||||
Chilly Water (6) | |||||
Cosmic Confidante (5) |
The Southern Fried Chicken festy crowd was back and ready for night two. The VIP executive box seats had luxurious AstroTurf to dance on, while everyone else was subject to the white plastic dancefloor covering the earth. Spirits were high, the weather was good, and almost two hours after sunset, JB greeted the crowd, “Good evening, everybody!” And, with that, the boys were off with a fan favorite: Bust It Big. Jojo kicked it off with a funky intro and the rhythm section was close behind. While this was the 242nd time we rode liquor down to Mexico, it’s never once been recorded in a studio, and it was only the fifth time in Panic history a show opened with it. Here are the other four times: 10/21/21, 01/13/23, 05/06/23, and 03/22/24.
The song didn’t quite end, and Duane and Sunny kept drumming right into Travelin’ Light. A cover that doesn’t quite feel like a cover anymore given this was the 1,044th time played, all six cylinders crushed this one, most notably Jimmy and Jojo.
A smooth transition brought the tempo down a bit with This Part of Town. JB’s voice was smooth as butter, it’s hard not to hear Mikey’s voice even if it’s only in the mind’s ear. The song came to a beautiful rumbly end, and Schools’ bass menacingly started Imitation Leather Shoes. Who doesn’t love this creepy crawly absolute throw down of a song. No need to fake it, we LOVE raging to this song in the WATLO VIP box seats!
Jojo brought the song to a full stop. Jimmy beautifully strummed the familiar notes to Travelin’ Man. We’ve grown accustomed to hearing The Waker immediately following Travelin’ Man, as a thorough nod to our fallen lingering lead, Mikey Houser. Travelin Man was supposedly written by JB and Mikey on Mikey’s deathbed, it was subsequently released and first played after his death (FTP: 5/2/03). This was the 100th time The Waker had been played, notably bringing the song into triple digits! Welcome to the club, Waker, you’re in great company! The topic of the WATLO Podcast pilot episode is “Favorite Mikey song” and how can you have an entire episode dedicated to Mikey songs without talking about The Waker? You can check out the episode HERE. In short, we are eternally grateful it’s back in rotation, thanks to that faithful New Years Eve show on 12/31/18.
The segue into Jamais Vu was flawless, no one missed a beat, and thankfully we can listen to it over and over and over again with all our old friends. Right towards the end, a beautiful blissful jam emerged until Jojo’s keys led into a honky tonk introduction of a classic. She ain’t no flower child, it’s GRETA, ya’ll!
Schools got crafty with his “how’s it gonna beeeee?” getting higher and higher and serenading us with his questioning. Once everyone was done wondering exactly how it was going to be, the jam absolutely took off. Jimmy played us ALL the notes, Schools held it the funk down (per usual), and everyone truly got after it. Best jamming of the set by far!
They all were on the same page, and transitioned stunningly into Life During Wartime. The perfect first set closer! This version wasn’t quite stretched out as the jammier version from Chicago (6/4/25) and was the fourth time played in 2025. Because it’s such a good set / show closer, our nerds got to work calculating how many times it’s ended a set or a show… in total, it’s been played 88 times, and ended a set or a show 51 times. According to our calculations, that’s 57.95% of the time. Let’s break it down further, shall we? Life During Wartime ended the encore 16 times, a one set-show twice, the first set 12 times, and the second set 21 times. NERD ALERT!
The song ended and without a word, only big smiles, the band exited the stage for set break. After 33 minutes, the boys came back on and moved their way into For What It’s Worth. Each member played enthusiastically, passionately, and with so much emotion, stressing the importance of the song’s message.
With barely a pause, Tall Boy began - an excellent festival song! While this was the 514th time ever played, a recent podcast episode about how Panic grabbed your leg discussed the 38th time ever played (when Tall Boy was just a Mini Baby Boy, aka “Battle Field”) - check it out HERE.
The song came to a full conclusion, but immediately following, Jojo’s keys led into King Baby. An obvious band favorite, this was the 10th time played in 2025, out of 11 total runs, making it the second-most played song of the year! Can you guess the most played? For the answer, go read the recap from the previous night (10/3/25).
The song flawlessly dropped right into Saint Ex, but shockingly straight into the ripping jam, usually played in the middle of the song. When they start a song with the middle or end of the song, it’s called a reversed intro. After playing the heavy jam for about a minute, JB started singing the first lines of the song. This was a really fun way to switch up a song they play quite often (7 out of 11 runs in 2025, to be exact) and kept us all on our toes. They’ve done reversed intros for Chilly Water and Papa’s Home, and we are excited to report on future reverse intros as they come up. We always encourage change and variety, it’s hard to do after almost 40 years, just ask our married friends. In the last minute, Sunny got to play with some toys as the song faded into Party At Your Mama’s House.
By about minute 9 of PAYMH, the entire band was jamming cohesively and energetically, making this the best jam of the set, and quite possibly the entire show. The song kind of fizzled out and Duane kicked up the drums to introduce Diner.
Well Diner certainly gave PAYMH a run for its money for best jam of the show. The minute leading up to JB’s rap was an all-out sweaty dance party. Then, JB graced us with a beautiful rap:
“Hanging in the diner, sitting in the light of Miss Lee. She opened up her leg, help a poor boy out. Ooooh, said c’mon c’mon c’mon in, I couldn’t sleep. I said, I know, I got kicked off my bench a little early this morning too. Oooh. Aww hanging in the light. Hanging in her light. Sun song, sun song. There’s sunshine creeping through the trees. Slidin’ out, snowy rooftop, into the window leaning against my coffee cup, keep it warm a little longer. Hanging in the light. Baskin’ in the light. Baskin’ in her smile. Miss Lee. Awwwww, ahhhhhhhh hanging in the light, hanging in the light. Awwwwwww.”
At about the 10-minute mark, the jam proceeded to heat up, Jojo and Jimmy had some fun trade-offs with Schools throwing it down and Sunny and Duane keeping the beats going strong. The jam transcended into a blissy ecstasy, with a very smooth transition into C. Brown.
After a beautiful rendition of C. Brown, every piece and part was perfectly in place, we wiped our tears thinking about how much we love our dogs, and All Time Low came next. Always a fun rockin’ number to get down to. JB threw in an extra “awwwwww” around 3.5 minutes, which melted our hearts like butter. Jimmy annihilated the jam and if there was a roof on the venue, it would have been blown clear off! Thank God we were in a botanical garden! No need to report any damage.
The song barely ended before the entire band roared right into Chilly Water. This was an exceedingly wet Chilly Water, given the plethora of water refill stations in the festival grounds. Right around 4:14 we got an excellent drum solo from Sunny and Duane - go Sunny go!!! With no true “Drums” during the festival sets, this was a welcomed gift. At 4:50, the big man showed off his mastery of the bass guitar, then everyone got in the mix, including JB! Turn that man UP! JB’s voice was top tier, he made this version extra special. The amount of soul he put into this song… you’d never guess it was his 1,158th time singing it.
With a “yea yeahhh” from Dave, the set ended and the band exited the stage.
After a quick 3-minute break, the band came back on for Cosmic Confidante. The song came to a full stop. Duane slowly drummed his way into a Neil Young cover, Rockin’ in the Free World. It was last played in Chicago on 6/5/25, 16 shows ago, making this the longest LTP gap of the entire show. Originally released in 1989 on the album Freedom, the lyrics are incredibly dark… There's imagery around a woman throwing her baby away in a garbage can, homeless men suffering on the street, exceeding amounts of pollution and waste, and yet this underlying satire about how “free” we all are in the red, white, and blue. It’s a criticism from the George Bush era, yet completely applicable to today’s society as well. The boys crushed it and played with so much emotion and soul. They’ve only played it 9 times: three times with Mikey (10/4/94, 11/6/96, 4/3/00) and six times with Jimmy (10/25/15, 2/17/18, 5/27/22, 12/31/22, 6/5/25, and 10/4/25).
JB said, “Thank you, Neil Young. Thank you, Mempho. Thank you, Miss Edie Jackson on the good signs. Goodnight everybody!” And, with that the show concluded and Panic’s festival sets were over. Most fans stuck around for the final day of the festival including the headliner, Tyler Childers.
Looking forward to seeing you in Milwaukee - the exact opposite venue and environment of these two shows. Look for us in the Biergarten and get a nerd gift when you come talk to us about Panic!
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