Massachusetts (1135)

• March 6, 2025
• Colleen Johnson
• 1314
• 0

(Photo Credit: Erick Frost)

Last Tuesday night, I made a long-awaited return to City Winery to see Jon Foreman, both of his solo project and, of course, his long-time rock band Switchfoot, to bring his latest solo album, In Bloom, to life. While Foreman had played in this room before, the return to the room was something to be remembered as it was his first time playing at this venue without the rest of his Switchfoot bandmates and the first time he played songs off this album. But before I get ahead of myself here, the night started strong with Jordy Searcy, who later joined Foreman throughout his set. 

Searcy was the perfect way to warm up the show. His wit, humour, and grace were forever present throughout the set. Between big moments like “Rich” and closing his set out with a fan-requested “Getaway Car,” the story-telling aesthetic of the night began with Pearcy’s set. Each song garnered an introduction. Be it with “Rich,” saying, “This song’s called ‘Rich’, it’s about being broke,” to talking about the song, “Clean The House”. The story was prefaced by Searcy explaining that he FaceTimes his wife for a song each night and asked for a crowd volunteer to hold the phone. At this moment that volunteer said hello to his wife with the wife waving back, and Searcy went, “That’s fair, she’s much more pleasant to look at than me.”; to then make the audience swoon by sharing the story behind this song in particular, sharing that the song is about all the things he had to do to clean his house before his now wife was coming to town for the weekend since it was the weekend he was going to propose. 

Searcy’s ease with the crowd and whit won the crowd over with big whoops and cheers in the latter part of the set. That should be expected from the clearly die-hard group of Jon Foreman fans in attendance. Of course, he had fans of his own, but any artist opening up a Foreman show will surely have a very responsive audience, as Searcy was able to receive. But even Searcy was ready to get off the stage, quipping, “I’m not here to play a set, I’m here to see a Jon Foreman show.” 

As talked about later in the show, and as I’m always looking for when in a setting like this, or a wild punk show to be fair too, the crowd interactions within the crowd started to show here. You saw friends beginning to go up to each other, giving massive hugs. A woman sweetly said, “I knew I’d see my Switchfoot people here.” During Searcy’s show, a guy seated near me, at hearing Searcy sing, “I love your demon hair when you wake up,” gave a sweet little nod to assumingly his partner across the table from him. 

Just ten minutes after Searcy left the stage, the band members backing Foreman for this tour slowly made their way on stage. To lead it off was a seemingly very loved band member, from the yells from the crowd, “Keith!”. And that energy continued for the two other members of Jon’s live band before he made his way to the center of the stage. As aforementioned, while In Bloom isn’t his first solo album, it was definitely the star of the show for this show in particular. As the first show of his current tour, and as talked about on stage, the setlist will likely change up every night, but who doesn’t love some surprises? For Boston, the show started with the last track off his most recent record, “Sojourn (epliogue),” before jumping whole heartily into tracks like “Lovers are Believers” and “When The Sidewalk Ends”. 

At this point, Foreman also broke out the first of several Switchfoot songs in his set, the earliest appearance being a gorgeous stripped-down rendition of “Meant To Live”. Shaking it up a bit with a cover of “Lean On Me,” which became a group sing-along with the crowd, the band’s smiles and interactions with each other on stage were angelic and so pure, in a clearly supportive nature to all parties involved. Foreman introduced the rest of his bandmates twice by the end of the fourth song, even commenting, “You’re witnessing decades of friendship up here.”  It was an energy that expounded itself on to the crowd, too. 

While I wouldn’t say the set unraveled at this point, it turned into a crowd request affair, with its limits, of course, set by Foreman. While he did indulge the crowd with “Southbound Train,” he commented at another point in the set, saying, “We’ve got a lot of people wanting songs I’m not playing, maybe I should play them.” As the set progressed, clear highlights for those in attendance included “Your Love is Strong” and  “I Propose A Toast,” which was the point where opener Searcy was invited on stage and remained there for the rest of the set. 

While it could have been part of the performance, and I’m sure it was rehearsed, Searcy and the rest of the band just seemed to be happy to be there. And that energy was returned right back from Foreman. Speaking to Searcy, sweetly at one time, he said, “I’m honored to be hitting the opposite of San Diego with you.” He would also constantly lean on his band mate, Keith Tutt, in an endearing way, of course, to the point that he even said, “Keith is my North Star to which key we’re playing in.” 

The set progressed through storytelling and further tracks off of the previously talked-about latest album for Foreman with moments like “Eulogy,” which he sang with Searcy. After this moment, Searcy said, “I know all the songs,” and Jon just responded, “You know more than I do.” Foreman made it a little easy, though, with both covers of tracks like Nirvana’s “In Bloom,” a Beach Boys cover, and an encore composed of two of Switchfoot’s biggest hits. While “Only Hope” kicked off the encore, Foreman quickly said, “Where’s Jordy Searcy? Where you at?” With Searcy quickly jumping back on stage like a puppy dog, he joined the band for the night’s final moment, “Dare You To Move.” 

The show ended with a standing ovation and a room full of cheers and whoops as the band bowed twice together to signal the end of the show. The appreciation clearly went both ways, and it was definitely a night fans of Foreman and new Searcy fans will be thinking about for quite a while. Foreman ended the night as well, saying, “The rest of the guys in Switchfoot say hello. We’re in the middle of writing a rock and roll record.” 

While Switchfoot has already played multiple shows in MA since the return to live music, hopefully,  Foreman’s solo shows won’t be limited to just this run. Forever road dogs, keep your ears peeled for more from both Searcy and Foreman, and keep your eyes on the City Winery schedule. Some special shows are coming up, including my personal recommendation of some fellow storytellers, Chuck Ragan and Cory Branan, coming up on March 20th!