Gavin DeGraw in Manhattan

Gavin DeGraw in Manhattan

Gavin DeGraw is kicking off his joint Christmas Tour this December with Colbie Caillat. Show dates span venues on the West Coast, but DeGraw posted a message on Instagram to his East Coast fans saying “heard you wanted some Christmas shows as well so we are coming to you!” with a graphic announcing four East Coast shows including a final stop at NYC’s Town Hall.

DeGraw opened the Manhattan show with a few notable Christmas songs, pausing between tunes to tell the crowd that he’d “love to sing a Chanukah song, but I don’t know any. I only know the dreidel song. So instead, I’ll sing this” and then proceeded to play “I’ll Be Home For Christmas”. DeGraw shared his opinions on classic Christmas music versus more contemporary hits saying “new Christmas songs sucks and if you disagree with me you’re wrong” eliciting a laugh from his audience. He followed that thought up with “Elvis Presley released a Christmas song that tried to be sexy which is what Christmas songs should not be but if there was one that was going to be it would be this one” which led into “Santa Clause Is Back In Town”. 

Between songs, fans in the front of the venue kept calling out “spin the dreidel!” to which DeGraw replied “you wanna hear that dreidel song bad don’t you?”, yet he never fulfilled their requests. Later in the night the artists talked about how his favorite Christmas movie is “obviously Die Hard” but also on top of his list is White Christmas so he sang the title track from that film. During the song, the singer announced a surprise guest who joined him on stage. Louis Cato who plays guitar on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert walked out to play and sing along during the number.

DeGraw took a few minutes to mention and thank all of his band members. He named them, talked about how long he has been working with each of them and even shouted out all of the cool bands each of them has worked with. I was appreciative of the fact that he even thanked his photographer Alberto. Photographers rarely get public recognition so this quick thank you meant something to me as a photographer. The holiday portion of the show came to close with “The Christmas Song” and then DeGraw joked “Now let’s do an unchristmas song. This is a song about the devil. No, I’m just kidding!” and he sang Michael Buble’s “Sway”. DeGraw told his fans how much he loves Buble, and also how he loves the Ralph Lauren jacket he was wearing on stage. He told fans that he’s not asking anyone to get him a gift, but if you do, he’s a men’s large. The talk of gifts segued into a fan from the crowd saying she had a gift for him. It turns out the fan, Stephanie” flew in from Hamburg, Germany just for this show, and she brought a gift in the hopes she could get it to DeGraw. To thank her, someone from the singers team came out with a setlist for him to sign and give to her in exchange. To follow that up, DeGraw was interacting with some fans in the audience and noticed a kid eating candy, she offered him some and then was brought up on stage so she could share her Sour Patch Kids with the whole band. 

DeGraw then got the crowd excited by transitioning into singing some of his own songs. He told the story of how years ago, he was emotional and called his mom on a landline to talk. She told him to come home for a couple days. They went for a drive together upstate to a church where there was a sermon about Samson. DeGraw remembers learning that at the end of Samson’s life he asked God to give him strength one last time and that it’s never too late to get back to God. He went home to his family’s old piano, and wrote “Chariot” that night. The crowd sang in unison as DeGraw played the hit and there was a strong sense of understanding during the chorus now that the room had the context behind the lyrics. 

Closing

Gavin DeGraw’s NYC Town Hall Christmas concert was a warm, nostalgic night. With a setlist loaded with holiday classics and some fun banter from the singer, it was a nice way to spend a Tuesday evening.   
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