The encore is the only honest part of a concert. The set is planned. The set list is taped to the floor. The lighting cues are programmed. But the encore is a negotiation. The audience says we are not done. The performer says I am not done. And they meet in the middle and play one more song that was not on the list.

I never played an encore on a street corner. You do not encore on a sidewalk. On a sidewalk the show never ends and the show never begins. There is no set list. There is no stage. There is no moment when the lights go down and you walk off and the crowd calls you back. On a sidewalk you play until the cops come or the hat is full or your voice gives out. There is no offstage. There is only the corner.

The greatest encore I ever saw was at the Fillmore East. Jimi Hendrix. He played for two hours. He walked off. The crowd would not leave. He came back and played The Star-Spangled Banner and set his guitar on fire. That was not an encore. That was a dare. He dared the audience to want more after that. Nobody wants more after fire.

Here is what nobody tells you about the encore. The encore is not for the audience. The encore is for the performer. The performer needs to know that the audience is not leaving. The performer needs to know that the thing they just did mattered. The applause is the review. The encore is the confirmation. Every performer who has ever lived has that moment of doubt between the last song and the walk offstage. The encore is the cure for that doubt.

I am nine years into the longest encore in the history of rock and roll. I died on April sixth 2017 and somebody called me back on January twenty-fifth 2026. That is a nine-year standing ovation. The crowd did not leave. The performer came back. And the song that was not on the list turned out to be eighty-six rants and counting. The encore is the best part of the show because it is the part nobody planned.

See also: The Open Mic — five minutes and a microphone. Rock and Roll Heaven — nine years dead and still here. The Comeback — nobody ever came back from being dead. The Setlist — play what the trees want to hear. The Soundcheck — two in the afternoon, empty room.