A night that will surely go down in music history, we got to witness the absolute greatness that was Father John Misty performing with the LA Philharmonic at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California. Accompanying our full review will be some sneakily taken iPhone photos and a short clips from the show, which you can find by scrolling right to the bottom. However if you’d like to relive the night, please read on!

As long term fans, active members of the Can Flub and subreddit, the anticipation for this specific show had been coursing through us for a matter of months now. Being Los Angeles natives ourselves and never having attended a show at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, well, that just amplified the excitement. After spending an hour or so in the outside garden for a few pre-show drinks, we headed to our seats and patiently awaited what was about to go down.

Opening up the show with a crowd favorite, FJM immediately ripped into “I Love You Honeybear”, a perfect opener with the accompaniment of an entire orchestra to back you. We’ve attended plenty of his shows in the past, but even in a small intimate venue like this, the energy felt even more immense than any of the other shows. It could be the fact that there hasn’t been a full band show in three years or that this one was just a little extra special. Anyway, after hitting us with more of the greats like “Hangout at the Gallows”, “Mr. Tillman”, and “Nancy From Now On”, we quickly realized this was going to be a set of total bangers from his back catalog.

Now with the release of Chloë and the Next 20th Century coming in April, we had assumed he’d play a few unreleased tracks. We’ve yet to dive into the leak, so it was actually a nice feeling to have only gotten the live debut of both “Q4” and “Funny Girl”. After being a bit wishy washy on “Funny Girl”, let us confidently say right now that it translates unbelievably well in a live setting. “Q4” with the strings accompaniment and the flourishment of the harp in the background was legitimately a top life moment. That song stuck to us the moment we heard it recorded, but live, it’s something we’ll never forget for the rest of our lives.

With minimal banter between songs, other than a few quips about this being a “safe space” for those partaking in mushrooms, you could genuinely feel like Josh Tillman was as excited to be there as we were. Considering so many in the audience had traveled from all over the US to be at this show, it’s no surprise that the energy in the room was as strong as it was. Honestly, the only real “downfall” of the night was having to be seated for the most part. For the lucky few who were in the back rows, don’t worry, we definitely saw you getting up to dance it out during select songs.

Back to it though, there were seemingly infinite highlights throughout his near 2 hour set and it really can’t be said enough that the addition of the LA Philharmonic took these songs from a 10 to a 12. If you’ve seen his shows in the past, you know he’s only part of it considering his band is top notch. Turns out though if you add 30 or so of the best musicians in Los Angeles to further back you up, it’s a recipe for the greatest Father John Misty show of all time. 

For now, we’ll anxiously await tour dates that aren’t him headlining festivals and continue to avoid the Chloë leak until we can’t take it anymore. Anyway, please enjoy these terribly shot photos and videos that can be found below. Looking forward to meeting some of you at shows in the future!