Last night, one of my all-time musical heroes, Thomas Dolby played here in Seattle (at the Fenix Underground). How was the show? Well, in a word -- amazing. Dolby was the only performer on stage during his set (aside from a couple techs to take care of the video aspect) -- which isn't too terribly unusual, except that nothing was canned. Most folks would just play with a laptop now, doing the basic backing tracks while they play the lead instrument and sing, and back in the day, it was the same thing, only with a reel-to-reel. (There's an amusing story of one early They Might Be Giants show where a reel unspooled and their manager had to go into the audience and collect the meters of tape while the Johns sort of screwed around dumbfounded.)